New Project: Agent Based Models & Ecosystem Tipping Points

Things continue to keep rapidly changing this year, and I’ve started on another new academic project!

Back in May I started a new Post-Doc Research Fellowship in the Global Environmental Change and Earth Observation group in the Geography and Environment dept. of the University of Southampton, working on the ReCoVER Network-funded pilot study project “Agent-based models for the analysis of early warning signals of ecosystem tipping points” with PI James G. Dyke. In this project we’re working on some new potential early warning signals for ecosystems near tipping points – in particular looking at the ecosystems’ compositional disorder and food web dynamics and replicating these using Agent Based Models (ABMs) – using lake eutrophication as a case study. We’re hoping this 6 month pilot study will lead to some new useful metrics for detecting potential tipping points in ecosystems (and socio-ecological systems) developed through a bigger project in future. Thanks again to the ReCoVER Network for funding this project! This means I’ll still be In Southampton for the rest of 2017, but beyond that who knows…

In other news, I’ll be giving a Winchester Café Scientifique talk on Monday 4th September about Climate Tipping Points (linked to my http://www.climatetippingpoints.info outreach project) – I’ll be talking about what climate tipping points are, how they might affect us, and whether we can predict them, as well as considering how they make climate change more of a “wicked problem” to deal with. Come along if you’re around!