Mathematical Biology Seminar
Date: November 8, 2021
Time: 4:00PM - 5:00PM
Location: BLOC 302
Speaker: Alexandru Hening, Texas A&M University
Title: Harvesting in discrete-time stochastic population models
Abstract: We analyze the long-term behavior of interacting populations which can be controlled through harvesting. The dynamics is assumed to be discrete in time and stochastic due to the effect of environmental fluctuations. We present powerful extinction and coexistence criteria when there are one or two interacting species. We then use these tools in order to see when harvesting leads to extinction or persistence of species, as well as what the optimal harvesting strategies, which maximize the expected long-term yield, look like. For single species systems, we show under certain conditions that the optimal harvesting strategy is of bang-bang type: there is a threshold under which there is no harvesting, while everything above this threshold gets harvested.