Species Clustering in Competitive Lotka-Volterra Models

2007/02/16 by Simone Pigolotti, Cristobal Lopez, Crístobal López +2 · 3 citations
Agricultural and Biological Sciences · Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · Environmental Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Ecosystem dynamics and resilience #Evolution and Genetic Dynamics #Plant and animal studies #nlin.PS #q-bio.PE

paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.98.258101

published as Phys. Rev. Lett. 98, 258101 (2007) · 4 pages, 3 figures

arxiv created 2007/02/16 · openalex publication_date 2007/06/18 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28

Abstract

We study the properties of general Lotka-Volterra models with competitive interactions. The intensity of the competition depends on the position of species in an abstract niche space through an interaction kernel. We show analytically and numerically that the properties of these models change dramatically when the Fourier transform of this kernel is not positive definite, due to a pattern-forming instability. We estimate properties of the species distributions, such as the steady number of species and their spacings, for different types of interactions, including stretched exponential and constant kernels.

Citations

• Neutral theory and relative species abundance in ecology
• Pattern formation outside of equilibrium

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