Interrelation between spatial and temporal variations in plankton biomass: a study by mathematical modeling

Medvinsky, A.B., Tikhonova, I.A., Li, B.L. and Malchow, H. (2003) Interrelation between spatial and temporal variations in plankton biomass: a study by mathematical modeling. Biophysics, 48 (1), 93-98.

Abstract

Dynamics of aquatic biological communities in patchy environments is a topic of substantial interest in the study of interrelationships between phenomena of very different space and time scales. A simple reaction-diffusion model of trophic interactions between phytoplankton, zooplankton, and fish was used to examine how the intricate dynamics of plankton changes on varying the rate of fish predation upon zooplankton. In this study, plankton was assumed to be distributed between two biotopes, of which one contained no fish because of the hydrological conditions in that biotope. Varying the fish predation rate did not bias the correspondence between the scales of spatial patterning and temporal changes in its biomass. Specifically, plankton distributed in large patches exhibited regular temporal oscillations of its abundance. The formation of small patches was associated with chaotic oscillations. As in the case when the fish predation rate was fixed, the dynamic behavior of plankton was determined by the coexistence of a chaotic attractor with a limit cycle.

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Contributors

Author: I.A. Tikhonova

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