Interplay between partnership formation and competition in generalized May-Leonard games

Abstract

In order to better understand the interplay of partnership and competition in population dynamics we study a family of generalized May-Leonard models with $N$ species. These models have a very rich structure, characterized by different types of space-time patterns. Interesting partnership formations emerge following the maxim that "the enemy of my enemy is my friend." In specific cases cyclic dominance within coarsening clusters yields a peculiar coarsening behavior with intriguing pattern formation. We classify the different types of dynamics through the analysis of the square of the adjacency matrix. The dependence of the population densities on emerging pattern and propagating wave fronts is elucidated through a Fourier analysis. Finally, after having identified collaborating teams, we study interface fluctuations where we initially populate different parts of the system with different teams.