@article{TEXTUAL,
      recid = {9588},
      author = {Grilli, Jacopo and Barabás, György and Allesina, Stefano},
      title = {Metapopulation Persistence in Random Fragmented  Landscapes},
      journal = {PLOS Computational Biology},
      address = {2015-05-20},
      number = {TEXTUAL},
      abstract = {Habitat destruction and land use change are making the  world in which natural populations live increasingly  fragmented, often leading to local extinctions. Although  local populations might undergo extinction, a  metapopulation may still be viable as long as patches of  suitable habitat are connected by dispersal, so that empty  patches can be recolonized. Thus far, metapopulations  models have either taken a mean-field approach, or have  modeled empirically-based, realistic landscapes. Here we  show that an intermediate level of complexity between these  two extremes is to consider random landscapes, in which the  patches of suitable habitat are randomly arranged in an  area (or volume). Using methods borrowed from the  mathematics of Random Geometric Graphs and Euclidean Random  Matrices, we derive a simple, analytic criterion for the  persistence of the metapopulation in random fragmented  landscapes. Our results show how the density of patches,  the variability in their value, the shape of the dispersal  kernel, and the dimensionality of the landscape all  contribute to determining the fate of the metapopulation.  Using this framework, we derive sufficient conditions for  the population to be spatially localized, such that  spatially confined clusters of patches act as a source of  dispersal for the whole landscape. Finally, we show that a  regular arrangement of the patches is always detrimental  for persistence, compared to the random arrangement of the  patches. Given the strong parallel between metapopulation  models and contact processes, our results are also  applicable to models of disease spread on spatial  networks.},
      url = {http://knowledge.uchicago.edu/record/9588},
}