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Description
There has been important progress in understanding ecological dynamics through the development of the theory of ecological stoichiometry. This fast growing theory provides new constraints and mechanisms that can be formulated into mathematical models. Stoichiometric models incorporate the effects of both food quantity and food quality into a single framework

There has been important progress in understanding ecological dynamics through the development of the theory of ecological stoichiometry. This fast growing theory provides new constraints and mechanisms that can be formulated into mathematical models. Stoichiometric models incorporate the effects of both food quantity and food quality into a single framework that produce rich dynamics. While the effects of nutrient deficiency on consumer growth are well understood, recent discoveries in ecological stoichiometry suggest that consumer dynamics are not only affected by insufficient food nutrient content (low phosphorus (P): carbon (C) ratio) but also by excess food nutrient content (high P:C). This phenomenon, known as the stoichiometric knife edge, in which animal growth is reduced not only by food with low P content but also by food with high P content, needs to be incorporated into mathematical models. Here we present Lotka-Volterra type models to investigate the growth response of Daphnia to algae of varying P:C ratios. Using a nonsmooth system of two ordinary differential equations (ODEs), we formulate the first model to incorporate the phenomenon of the stoichiometric knife edge. We then extend this stoichiometric model by mechanistically deriving and tracking free P in the environment. This resulting full knife edge model is a nonsmooth system of three ODEs. Bifurcation analysis and numerical simulations of the full model, that explicitly tracks phosphorus, leads to quantitatively different predictions than previous models that neglect to track free nutrients. The full model shows that the grazer population is sensitive to excess nutrient concentrations as a dynamical free nutrient pool induces extreme grazer population density changes. These modeling efforts provide insight on the effects of excess nutrient content on grazer dynamics and deepen our understanding of the effects of stoichiometry on the mechanisms governing population dynamics and the interactions between trophic levels.
ContributorsPeace, Angela (Author) / Kuang, Yang (Thesis advisor) / Elser, James J (Committee member) / Baer, Steven (Committee member) / Tang, Wenbo (Committee member) / Kang, Yun (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
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Description
This thesis presents a model for the buying behavior of consumers in a technology market. In this model, a potential consumer is not perfectly rational, but exhibits bounded rationality following the axioms of prospect theory: reference dependence, diminishing returns and loss sensitivity. To evaluate the products on different criteria, the

This thesis presents a model for the buying behavior of consumers in a technology market. In this model, a potential consumer is not perfectly rational, but exhibits bounded rationality following the axioms of prospect theory: reference dependence, diminishing returns and loss sensitivity. To evaluate the products on different criteria, the analytic hierarchy process is used, which allows for relative comparisons. The analytic hierarchy process proposes that when making a choice between several alternatives, one should measure the products by comparing them relative to each other. This allows the user to put numbers to subjective criteria. Additionally, evidence suggests that a consumer will often consider not only their own evaluation of a product, but also the choices of other consumers. Thus, the model in this paper applies prospect theory to products with multiple attributes using word of mouth as a criteria in the evaluation.
ContributorsElkholy, Alexander (Author) / Armbruster, Dieter (Thesis advisor) / Kempf, Karl (Committee member) / Li, Hongmin (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
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Description
Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) is any medical or public health procedure used before exposure to the disease causing agent, its purpose is to prevent, rather than treat or cure a disease. Most commonly, PrEP refers to an experimental HIV-prevention strategy that would use antiretrovirals to protect HIV-negative people from HIV infection.

Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) is any medical or public health procedure used before exposure to the disease causing agent, its purpose is to prevent, rather than treat or cure a disease. Most commonly, PrEP refers to an experimental HIV-prevention strategy that would use antiretrovirals to protect HIV-negative people from HIV infection. A deterministic mathematical model of HIV transmission is developed to evaluate the public-health impact of oral PrEP interventions, and to compare PrEP effectiveness with respect to different evaluation methods. The effects of demographic, behavioral, and epidemic parameters on the PrEP impact are studied in a multivariate sensitivity analysis. Most of the published models on HIV intervention impact assume that the number of individuals joining the sexually active population per year is constant or proportional to the total population. In the second part of this study, three models are presented and analyzed to study the PrEP intervention, with constant, linear, and logistic recruitment rates. How different demographic assumptions can affect the evaluation of PrEP is studied. When provided with data, often least square fitting or similar approaches can be used to determine a single set of approximated parameter values that make the model fit the data best. However, least square fitting only provides point estimates and does not provide information on how strongly the data supports these particular estimates. Therefore, in the third part of this study, Bayesian parameter estimation is applied on fitting ODE model to the related HIV data. Starting with a set of prior distributions for the parameters as initial guess, Bayes' formula can be applied to obtain a set of posterior distributions for the parameters which makes the model fit the observed data best. Evaluating the posterior distribution often requires the integration of high-dimensional functions, which is usually difficult to calculate numerically. Therefore, the Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) method is used to approximate the posterior distribution.
ContributorsZhao, Yuqin (Author) / Kuang, Yang (Thesis advisor) / Taylor, Jesse (Committee member) / Armbruster, Dieter (Committee member) / Tang, Wenbo (Committee member) / Kang, Yun (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
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Description
Bacteriophage (phage) are viruses that infect bacteria. Typical laboratory experiments show that in a chemostat containing phage and susceptible bacteria species, a mutant bacteria species will evolve. This mutant species is usually resistant to the phage infection and less competitive compared to the susceptible bacteria species. In some experiments, both

Bacteriophage (phage) are viruses that infect bacteria. Typical laboratory experiments show that in a chemostat containing phage and susceptible bacteria species, a mutant bacteria species will evolve. This mutant species is usually resistant to the phage infection and less competitive compared to the susceptible bacteria species. In some experiments, both susceptible and resistant bacteria species, as well as phage, can coexist at an equilibrium for hundreds of hours. The current research is inspired by these observations, and the goal is to establish a mathematical model and explore sufficient and necessary conditions for the coexistence. In this dissertation a model with infinite distributed delay terms based on some existing work is established. A rigorous analysis of the well-posedness of this model is provided, and it is proved that the susceptible bacteria persist. To study the persistence of phage species, a "Phage Reproduction Number" (PRN) is defined. The mathematical analysis shows phage persist if PRN > 1 and vanish if PRN < 1. A sufficient condition and a necessary condition for persistence of resistant bacteria are given. The persistence of the phage is essential for the persistence of resistant bacteria. Also, the resistant bacteria persist if its fitness is the same as the susceptible bacteria and if PRN > 1. A special case of the general model leads to a system of ordinary differential equations, for which numerical simulation results are presented.
ContributorsHan, Zhun (Author) / Smith, Hal (Thesis advisor) / Armbruster, Dieter (Committee member) / Kawski, Matthias (Committee member) / Kuang, Yang (Committee member) / Thieme, Horst (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
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Description
Modern measurement schemes for linear dynamical systems are typically designed so that different sensors can be scheduled to be used at each time step. To determine which sensors to use, various metrics have been suggested. One possible such metric is the observability of the system. Observability is a binary condition

Modern measurement schemes for linear dynamical systems are typically designed so that different sensors can be scheduled to be used at each time step. To determine which sensors to use, various metrics have been suggested. One possible such metric is the observability of the system. Observability is a binary condition determining whether a finite number of measurements suffice to recover the initial state. However to employ observability for sensor scheduling, the binary definition needs to be expanded so that one can measure how observable a system is with a particular measurement scheme, i.e. one needs a metric of observability. Most methods utilizing an observability metric are about sensor selection and not for sensor scheduling. In this dissertation we present a new approach to utilize the observability for sensor scheduling by employing the condition number of the observability matrix as the metric and using column subset selection to create an algorithm to choose which sensors to use at each time step. To this end we use a rank revealing QR factorization algorithm to select sensors. Several numerical experiments are used to demonstrate the performance of the proposed scheme.
ContributorsIlkturk, Utku (Author) / Gelb, Anne (Thesis advisor) / Platte, Rodrigo (Thesis advisor) / Cochran, Douglas (Committee member) / Renaut, Rosemary (Committee member) / Armbruster, Dieter (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
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Description
Factory production is stochastic in nature with time varying input and output processes that are non-stationary stochastic processes. Hence, the principle quantities of interest are random variables. Typical modeling of such behavior involves numerical simulation and statistical analysis. A deterministic closure model leading to a second

Factory production is stochastic in nature with time varying input and output processes that are non-stationary stochastic processes. Hence, the principle quantities of interest are random variables. Typical modeling of such behavior involves numerical simulation and statistical analysis. A deterministic closure model leading to a second order model for the product density and product speed has previously been proposed. The resulting partial differential equations (PDE) are compared to discrete event simulations (DES) that simulate factory production as a time dependent M/M/1 queuing system. Three fundamental scenarios for the time dependent influx are studied: An instant step up/down of the mean arrival rate; an exponential step up/down of the mean arrival rate; and periodic variation of the mean arrival rate. It is shown that the second order model, in general, yields significant improvement over current first order models. Specifically, the agreement between the DES and the PDE for the step up and for periodic forcing that is not too rapid is very good. Adding diffusion to the PDE further improves the agreement. The analysis also points to fundamental open issues regarding the deterministic modeling of low signal-to-noise ratio for some stochastic processes and the possibility of resonance in deterministic models that is not present in the original stochastic process.
ContributorsWienke, Matthew (Author) / Armbruster, Dieter (Thesis advisor) / Jones, Donald (Committee member) / Platte, Rodrigo (Committee member) / Gardner, Carl (Committee member) / Ringhofer, Christian (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
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Description
Presented is a study on the chemotaxis reaction process and its relation with flow topology. The effect of coherent structures in turbulent flows is characterized by studying nutrient uptake and the advantage that is received from motile bacteria over other non-motile bacteria. Variability is found to be dependent on the

Presented is a study on the chemotaxis reaction process and its relation with flow topology. The effect of coherent structures in turbulent flows is characterized by studying nutrient uptake and the advantage that is received from motile bacteria over other non-motile bacteria. Variability is found to be dependent on the initial location of scalar impurity and can be tied to Lagrangian coherent structures through recent advances in the identification of finite-time transport barriers. Advantage is relatively small for initial nutrient found within high stretching regions of the flow, and nutrient within elliptic structures provide the greatest advantage for motile species. How the flow field and the relevant flow topology lead to such a relation is analyzed.
ContributorsJones, Kimberly (Author) / Tang, Wenbo (Thesis advisor) / Kang, Yun (Committee member) / Jones, Donald (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
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Description
The tools developed for the use of investigating dynamical systems have provided critical understanding to a wide range of physical phenomena. Here these tools are used to gain further insight into scalar transport, and how it is affected by mixing. The aim of this research is to investigate the efficiency

The tools developed for the use of investigating dynamical systems have provided critical understanding to a wide range of physical phenomena. Here these tools are used to gain further insight into scalar transport, and how it is affected by mixing. The aim of this research is to investigate the efficiency of several different partitioning methods which demarcate flow fields into dynamically distinct regions, and the correlation of finite-time statistics from the advection-diffusion equation to these regions.

For autonomous systems, invariant manifold theory can be used to separate the system into dynamically distinct regions. Despite there being no equivalent method for nonautonomous systems, a similar analysis can be done. Systems with general time dependencies must resort to using finite-time transport barriers for partitioning; these barriers are the edges of Lagrangian coherent structures (LCS), the analog to the stable and unstable manifolds of invariant manifold theory. Using the coherent structures of a flow to analyze the statistics of trapping, flight, and residence times, the signature of anomalous diffusion are obtained.

This research also investigates the use of linear models for approximating the elements of the covariance matrix of nonlinear flows, and then applying the covariance matrix approximation over coherent regions. The first and second-order moments can be used to fully describe an ensemble evolution in linear systems, however there is no direct method for nonlinear systems. The problem is only compounded by the fact that the moments for nonlinear flows typically don't have analytic representations, therefore direct numerical simulations would be needed to obtain the moments throughout the domain. To circumvent these many computations, the nonlinear system is approximated as many linear systems for which analytic expressions for the moments exist. The parameters introduced in the linear models are obtained locally from the nonlinear deformation tensor.
ContributorsWalker, Phillip (Author) / Tang, Wenbo (Thesis advisor) / Kostelich, Eric (Committee member) / Mahalov, Alex (Committee member) / Moustaoui, Mohamed (Committee member) / Platte, Rodrigo (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2018
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Description
The Kuramoto model is an archetypal model for studying synchronization in groups

of nonidentical oscillators where oscillators are imbued with their own frequency and

coupled with other oscillators though a network of interactions. As the coupling

strength increases, there is a bifurcation to complete synchronization where all oscillators

move with the same frequency and

The Kuramoto model is an archetypal model for studying synchronization in groups

of nonidentical oscillators where oscillators are imbued with their own frequency and

coupled with other oscillators though a network of interactions. As the coupling

strength increases, there is a bifurcation to complete synchronization where all oscillators

move with the same frequency and show a collective rhythm. Kuramoto-like

dynamics are considered a relevant model for instabilities of the AC-power grid which

operates in synchrony under standard conditions but exhibits, in a state of failure,

segmentation of the grid into desynchronized clusters.

In this dissertation the minimum coupling strength required to ensure total frequency

synchronization in a Kuramoto system, called the critical coupling, is investigated.

For coupling strength below the critical coupling, clusters of oscillators form

where oscillators within a cluster are on average oscillating with the same long-term

frequency. A unified order parameter based approach is developed to create approximations

of the critical coupling. Some of the new approximations provide strict lower

bounds for the critical coupling. In addition, these approximations allow for predictions

of the partially synchronized clusters that emerge in the bifurcation from the

synchronized state.

Merging the order parameter approach with graph theoretical concepts leads to a

characterization of this bifurcation as a weighted graph partitioning problem on an

arbitrary networks which then leads to an optimization problem that can efficiently

estimate the partially synchronized clusters. Numerical experiments on random Kuramoto

systems show the high accuracy of these methods. An interpretation of the

methods in the context of power systems is provided.
ContributorsGilg, Brady (Author) / Armbruster, Dieter (Thesis advisor) / Mittelmann, Hans (Committee member) / Scaglione, Anna (Committee member) / Strogatz, Steven (Committee member) / Welfert, Bruno (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2018
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Description
Need-based transfers (NBTs) are a form of risk-pooling in which binary welfare exchanges

occur to preserve the viable participation of individuals in an economy, e.g. reciprocal gifting

of cattle among East African herders or food sharing among vampire bats. With the

broad goal of better understanding the mathematics of such binary welfare and

Need-based transfers (NBTs) are a form of risk-pooling in which binary welfare exchanges

occur to preserve the viable participation of individuals in an economy, e.g. reciprocal gifting

of cattle among East African herders or food sharing among vampire bats. With the

broad goal of better understanding the mathematics of such binary welfare and risk pooling,

agent-based simulations are conducted to explore socially optimal transfer policies

and sharing network structures, kinetic exchange models that utilize tools from the kinetic

theory of gas dynamics are utilized to characterize the wealth distribution of an NBT economy,

and a variant of repeated prisoner’s dilemma is analyzed to determine whether and

why individuals would participate in such a system of reciprocal altruism.

From agent-based simulation and kinetic exchange models, it is found that regressive

NBT wealth redistribution acts as a cutting stock optimization heuristic that most efficiently

matches deficits to surpluses to improve short-term survival; however, progressive

redistribution leads to a wealth distribution that is more stable in volatile environments and

therefore is optimal for long-term survival. Homogeneous sharing networks with low variance

in degree are found to be ideal for maintaining community viability as the burden and

benefit of NBTs is equally shared. Also, phrasing NBTs as a survivor’s dilemma reveals

parameter regions where the repeated game becomes equivalent to a stag hunt or harmony

game, and thus where cooperation is evolutionarily stable.
ContributorsKayser, Kirk (Author) / Armbruster, Dieter (Thesis advisor) / Lampert, Adam (Committee member) / Ringhofer, Christian (Committee member) / Motsch, Sebastien (Committee member) / Gardner, Carl (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2018