An agent-based approach to food web assembly

Abstract

An agent-based model of population dynamics is presented. The model has as its expected behaviour the population dynamics of the equation-based Webworld model, within which large communities of species can be grown on evolutionary time scales. Such communities can be used in the agent-based model without disrupting the food web structure, and hence a unified model of evolutionary time and individual-based dynamics can be realised. Individuals encounter potential prey, and optimal foraging strategies are arrived at through natural selection.