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Host Shifts In Phytophagous Insects: A Mathematical Modeling Perspective, Meenakshi Venkataraman

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

I explored changes in predator-prey system stability with the addition of spatial heterogeneity in prey density dependent mortality. The results indicated that this addition led to greater stability for all prey spatial distributions if prey was aggregated or loosely aggregated. These results indicated prey spatial distribution was critical to population stability. I next explored whether predator emigration under the above conditions would lead to a host shift. I used Chesson and Murdoch's templates of host density independent (HDI) aggregation and host density dependent (HDD) aggregation in predators as the basis for my metapopulation models. I varied prey density dependent mortality …