19 January 2017
by IMA

When animals move in mysterious ways

When animals move in mysterious ways, a talk by Jon Pitchford (University of York)

Abstract

Animals move, and it seems logical that the mathematics of random walks might been useful to try to understand these movements.  I will give an overview of some fascinating insights, and one or two embarrassing failures, from the past decade or so.  These include the beauties of so-called Levy walks, which escape the statistical shackles of the Central Limit Theorem.  This turns out to be academically interesting in terms of the mathematics of behaviour and evolution.  Perhaps more importantly, exactly the same maths can be used practically in modelling epidemics and in describing the treatment of infectious disease. Parking details:  Parking in North East multi-storey car park is free after 4.30 pm. Access is via Pritchatts Road, Sat Nav B15 2SA No charge is made to attend meetings and non-members are welcome.
Image credit: The Great Migration river crossing by Thomson Safaris Tanzania Safaris and Kili Treks / Flickr / CC BY 2.0