Predicting the spread of invasive species
© Eawag – 2013
For the first time, scientists from EPFL and Eawag have provided experimental proof confirming a theoretical model of species invasion in natural environments. Their work was published in the journal PNAS just before Christmas.
Predicting how fast species invade a new area is a key question in ecology. The speed of invasion fronts is often predicted with a model developed in 1937 by R. A. Fisher and A. N. Kolmogorov. Researchers at Eawag and EPFL have now given the first complete experimental proof of the model. Furthermore, they developed a method that also predicts variability in the invasion dynamics. This can help to better understand the spread of invasive species and is in contrast to a recent assessment that claimed an intrinsic unpredictability of the phenomenon, due to its erratic nature.
Original publication: Giometto A, Rinaldo A, Carrara F & Altermatt F. Emerging predictable features of replicated biological invasion fronts. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, DOI:10.1073/pnas.1321167110.