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Applied Math Seminar: Wildlife Habitat Management using Optimization
2007-10-24
3:10 pm, Neill Hall 3W
Natalie Baerlocher
ABSTRACT: Territorial dispersers are species whose offsprings disperse away from the parents and inhabit new areas. In the typical case of the Northern Spotted Owl (NSO), the offsprings can occupy a new habitat only if it is suitable ("green") and is unoccupied by other members of the species. Hence the survival of the species depends on the availability of green habitat areas within the range of search of the offsprings. Lamberson et al. have defined a measure of the suitability of a landscape (a collection of habitat areas) for the survival of NSO called the Habitat Connectivity Index (HCI). A higher value of HCI indicates that there are more of the green habitat areas that lie close to each other. Long-term occupancy rates in each habitat area of a landscape were estimated by simulating a dynamic model of the system. The key bone of contention in the management of the habitat for the NSO is to decide which areas of the landscape should be maintained green, and which ones could be cleared (or utilized for other activities such as logging). We develop optimization models where the decision to either clear out or maintain each of a candidate set of habitat areas is represented by binary variables. The goal is to pick a limited subset of the candidate habitats that maximizes the HCI, which is a highly non-linear function. We obtain linear approximations that are as close to the original function as we want. We can solve the optimization models of arbitrary landscapes made of 125 by 75 (square) habitat patches within minutes on a standard PC. This is joint work with Bala Krishnamoorthy and David Allen as part of an ongoing Undergraduate Math Biology (UBM) project.
Weekly Scheduled Seminars
For more information please contact the individuals listed below.Monday
1:10pmAlgebra Seminar - Google Group
Neill Hall 106W
Contact: Judi McDonald
Tuesday
4:30-5:30pmMathematics Education Seminar
One World Cafe - Moscow, ID
Contact: Libby Knott
Wednesday
3:00-4:00pmApplied Math Seminar
Neill Hall 3W
Contact: Alan Genz
4:00-5:00pm
Reliability and Risk Seminar
Neill Hall 106W
Contact: Haijun Li
Thursday
Friday
4:15-5:15pmSpatial Reasoning: An Interdisciplinary Seminar
Cleveland Annex 309
Contact Co-organizers: Kim Vincent and Kathleen Ryan, Interior Design.
Various disciplines dealing with spatial relationships and reasoning will be examined. We will discuss what spatial reasoning is and how to improve students' spatial reasoning. The book, Learning to Think Spatially: GIS as a Support System in the K-12 Curriculum will be used. A read-only version may be found at www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=11019