Poster Session: Landscape Models to Predict Future Landscape Change

Individual Based Modeling in Geography and Landscape Ecology: Review and Assessment. Niphadkar, Madhura^*,1, ¹ Department of Geography, San Diego, CA, USA

ABSTRACT- The field of Landscape Ecology has grown and matured as a science. Progress in this relatively new science has occurred in theory, methods, and applications; the diversity of approaches and foci of research. Research priorities need to be identified so as to build basic theoretical foundations, and guide future research. Development of techniques and capabilities of computer technology have given great impetus to progressive research in modeling. Individual based models (IBMs) are an outcome of that modeling initiative and have grown in application and refinement to an extraordinary extent. IBMs are models of singular or multiple agents embedded within larger models of the environment, where the agents actions are simulated by changes and interactions with the environment and with each other. IBMs allow every individual to vary its behavior, allowing for complex behavior, which is influenced by interactions with other agents and the environment, and hence the behavior of the whole system simply emerges out of the model. This paper aims at reviewing the field of agent-based modeling and some issues involved. A brief examination of a few models is used to seek out common elements of different IBMs, and to explore their relevance in the spatial context. These include animal models (TIGMOD) as well as human social behavior models (eg RBsim). A comparison of these models on some common criteria is attempted. The use of IBMs as an approach in Landscape Ecology and Geography is then evaluated and a few suggestions are provided for future focus of research.

KEY WORDS: Agent-based models, Individual-based models, Swarm, TIGMOD, RBSim