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Dispersal, colored environmental noise, and spatial synchrony in population dynamics: analyzing a discrete host–parasitoid population model

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Ecological Research

Abstract

Spatial synchrony is common, and its influences and causes have attracted the interest of ecologists. Spatially correlated environmental noise, dispersal, and trophic interactions have been considered as the causes of spatial synchrony. In this study, we developed a spatially structured population model, which is described by coupled-map lattices. Our recent investigation showed that trophic correlation of environmental noise was another important factor that affects spatial synchrony. As a supplement, we considered the influence of the color of the environmental noise on the spatial synchrony in this study. The noise color refers to the temporal correlation in the time series data of the noise, and is expressed as the degree of (first-order) autocorrelation for autoregressive noise. Patterns of spatial synchrony were considered for stable, periodic (quasi-periodic), and chaotic population dynamics. Numerical simulations verified that the color of the environmental noise is another mechanism that causes spatial synchrony. Generally, the effect of the color of the noise on the synchrony is dependent on the type of dynamics (stable, cyclic, chaotic) present in the population. For cyclic dynamics, simulation results clearly demonstrate that reddened noise has higher synchrony than white noise. The importance of our research is that it enriches the theory of potential causes of spatial synchrony.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 30470298; 30700100) and the National Social Science Foundation of China (No. 04AJL007). We thank the two anonymous reviewers whose comments were important in improving this article.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Bioinformatics, School of Mathematics and Statistics, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, 730000, People’s Republic of China

    Zhiguang Liu, Meng Gao, Zizhen Li & Hua Liu

  2. State Key Laboratory of Arid Agroecology, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, 730000, People’s Republic of China

    Zizhen Li

Authors
  1. Zhiguang Liu
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  2. Meng Gao
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  3. Zizhen Li
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  4. Hua Liu
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Correspondence to Zizhen Li.

Appendix

Appendix

When the model has only local dispersal, our results are the same. We find that spatial synchrony increases with increasing dispersal rate d. Moreover, spatial synchrony also increases with increasing α. Some statistical tests were performed to investigate the effect of the red noise. When d = 0.15, the t-test (P = 2.2 × 10−16) clearly demonstrated that red noise (α = 0.8) has a stronger synchronizing effect than white noise (α = 0).

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Liu, Z., Gao, M., Li, Z. et al. Dispersal, colored environmental noise, and spatial synchrony in population dynamics: analyzing a discrete host–parasitoid population model. Ecol Res 24, 383–392 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11284-008-0513-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11284-008-0513-1

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