Scholars@Duke
William G. Wilson

William G. Wilson

Associate Professor Emeritus of Biology
Biology
wgw@duke.edu
Box 90338, Durham, NC 27708-0338
250 Bio Sci Bldg, Durham, NC 27708

Selected Publications

Urban ecology: Advancing science and society

Journal Article Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment · December 1, 2014 Urban ecology has quickly become established as a central part of ecological thinking. As cities continue to grow in size and number, two questions serve to unify this broad and multidisciplinary research landscape: (1) how can urban ecology contribute to ... Full text Cite

Individual-based chaos: extensions of the discrete logistic model.

Journal Article Journal of theoretical biology · December 2013 Simple models of density-dependent population growth such as the discrete logistic map provide powerful demonstrations of complex population dynamics. Yet it is unclear whether the dynamics observed in such idealized systems would be present, under realist ... Full text Cite

Influence of pollen transport dynamics on sire profiles and multiple paternity in flowering plants.

Journal Article PloS one · January 2013 In many flowering plants individual fruits contain a mixture of half- and full- siblings, reflecting pollination by several fathers. To better understand the mechanisms generating multiple paternity within fruits we present a theoretical framework linking ... Full text Cite

Ecosystem engineers: feedback and population dynamics.

Journal Article The American naturalist · April 2009 All organisms alter their abiotic environment, but ecosystem engineers are species with abiotic effects that may have to be explicitly accounted for when making predictions about population and community dynamics. The goal of this analysis is to identify t ... Full text Cite

Allee dynamics generated by protection mutualisms can drive oscillations in trophic cascades

Journal Article Theoretical Ecology · June 1, 2008 Understanding the relative effect of top predators and primary producers on intermediate trophic levels is a key question in ecology. Most previous work, however, has not considered either realistic nonlinearities in feedback between trophic levels or the ... Full text Cite

Preface

Journal Article Theoretical Ecology Series · December 1, 2007 Full text Cite

Evolutionary stable dispersal with pattern formation in a mutualist-antagonist system

Journal Article Evolutionary Ecology Research · October 1, 2007 Question: How does the evolution of dispersal distance affect the persistence, distribution, and population dynamics of a mutualist-antagonist system capable of endogenous pattern formation? Modelling approach: We let dispersal distance evolve within an in ... Cite

Animal dispersal dynamics promoting dioecy over hermaphroditism.

Journal Article The American naturalist · September 2007 Because of the separation of sexual function to male and female individuals, dioecious species have fewer pollen and seed bearers and thus experience disadvantages due to increased aggregation of reproductive function. Because of this disadvantage, models ... Full text Cite

Ecosystem engineering in space and time.

Journal Article Ecology letters · February 2007 The ecosystem engineering concept focuses on how organisms physically change the abiotic environment and how this feeds back to the biota. While the concept was formally introduced a little more than 10 years ago, the underpinning of the concept can be tra ... Full text Cite

Using ecosystem engineers to restore ecological systems.

Journal Article Trends in ecology & evolution · September 2006 Ecosystem engineers affect other organisms by creating, modifying, maintaining or destroying habitats. Despite widespread recognition of these often important effects, the ecosystem engineering concept has yet to be widely used in ecological applications. ... Full text Cite

Non-neutral community dynamics: Empirical predictions for ecosystem function and diversity from linearized consumer-resource interactions

Journal Article Oikos · July 1, 2006 A general model of linearized species interactions, essentially Lotka-Volterra theory, applied to questions of biodiversity has previously been shown to be a powerful tool for understanding local species-abundance patterns and community responses to enviro ... Full text Cite

The evolution of parasite manipulation of host dispersal.

Journal Article Proceedings. Biological sciences · May 2006 We investigate the evolution of manipulation of host dispersal behaviour by parasites using spatially explicit individual-based simulations. We find that when dispersal is local, parasites always gain from increasing their hosts' dispersal rate, although t ... Full text Cite

Environmental forcing and the competitive dynamics of a guild of cactus-tending ant mutualists

Journal Article Ecology · December 1, 2005 In generalized, multispecies mutualisms, competition among members of one guild can influence the net benefits that each species in the other guild receives. Hence seasonal factors that affect the dynamics of competition can also affect net benefits, espec ... Full text Cite

Plant population dynamics, pollinator foraging, and the selection of self-fertilization.

Journal Article The American naturalist · August 2005 Many flowering plants rely on pollinators, self-fertilization, or both for reproduction. We model the consequences of these features for plant population dynamics and mating system evolution. Our mating systems-based population dynamics model includes an A ... Full text Cite

Self-fertilization and the escape from pollen limitation in variable pollination environments.

Journal Article Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · May 2005 Seed production in many plants is pollen limited, likely because of unpredictable variation in the pollinator environment. One way for plants to escape the consequences of pollinator variability is to evolve mating systems, such as autonomous selfing, that ... Full text Cite

Coexistence of cycling and dispersing consumer species: Armstrong and McGehee in space.

Journal Article The American naturalist · February 2005 Two competing consumer species may coexist using a single homogeneous resource when the more efficient consumer--the one having the lowest equilibrium resource density--has a more nonlinear functional response that generates consumer-resource cycles. We ex ... Full text Cite

Effect of Predator Behavior on Spatial Scales and Stability

Journal Article Theoretical Population Biology · 2005 Cite

Host manipulation and parasite-induced dispersal

Journal Article Proc. Roy. Soc. Lond. · 2005 Cite

Robust decision-making under severe uncertainty for conservation management

Journal Article Ecological Applications · January 1, 2005 In conservation biology it is necessary to make management decisions for endangered and threatened species under severe uncertainty. Failure to acknowledge and treat uncertainty can lead to poor decisions. To illustrate the importance of considering uncert ... Full text Cite

Coexistence of competitors in metacommunities due to spatial variation in resource growth rates; does R* predict the outcome of competition?

Journal Article Ecology Letters · October 1, 2004 Simple mathematical models are used to investigate the coexistence of two consumers using a single limiting resource that is distributed over distinct patches, and that has unequal growth rates in the different patches. Relatively low movement rates or hig ... Full text Cite

Biodiversity and the Lotka-Volterra theory of species interactions: open systems and the distribution of logarithmic densities.

Journal Article Proceedings. Biological sciences · September 2004 Theoretical interest in the distributions of species abundances observed in ecological communities has focused recently on the results of models that assume all species are identical in their interactions with one another, and rely upon immigration and spe ... Full text Cite

When can two plant species facilitate each other's pollination?

Journal Article Oikos · April 1, 2004 Facilitation occurs when an increase in the density of one species causes an increase in the population growth rate or the density of a second species. In plants, ample evidence demonstrates that one species can facilitate another by ameliorating abiotic c ... Full text Cite

Ecological dynamics of mutualist/antagonist communities.

Journal Article The American naturalist · October 2003 One approach to understanding how mutualisms function in community settings is to model well-studied pairwise interactions in the presence of the few species with which they interact most strongly. In nature, such species are often specialized antagonists ... Full text Cite

Biodiversity and species interactions: Extending Lotka-Volterra community theory

Journal Article Ecology Letters · October 1, 2003 A new analysis of the nearly century-old Lotka - Volterra theory allows us to link species interactions to biodiversity patterns, including: species abundance distributions, estimates of total community size, patterns of community invasibility, and predict ... Full text Cite

Coexistence of mutualists and exploiters on spatial landscapes

Journal Article Ecological Monographs · August 1, 2003 Mutualisms are almost ubiquitously exploited by species that gain the benefits that mutualists offer to each other, but that offer nothing in return. This paper investigates the possible dynamical outcomes of a mechanistically formulated model system, invo ... Full text Cite

Reproductive uncertainty and the relative competitiveness of simultaneous hermaphroditism versus dioecy.

Journal Article The American naturalist · August 2003 Hermaphroditism is typically associated with a sedentary existence, whereas dioecy is associated with mobility. This pattern is reflected within flowering plants, as dioecious species commonly possess traits that promote high dispersal. We investigated the ... Full text Cite

Three-way coexistence in obligate mutualist-exploiter interactions: the potential role of competition.

Journal Article The American naturalist · June 2003 Many mutualisms host "exploiter" species that consume the benefits provided by one or both mutualists without reciprocating. Exploiters have been widely assumed to destabilize mutualisms, yet they are common. We develop models to explore conditions for loc ... Full text Cite

Three-way coexistence in obligate mutualist--exploiter interactions.

Journal Article The American Naturalist · 2003 Cite

SU5416 delays wound healing through inhibition of TGF-beta 1 activation.

Journal Article Cancer Biol Ther · 2002 Angiogenesis, development of new blood vessels, is essential for wound healing and tumor growth. A potentially important side effect of anti-angiogenic therapy can be delayed wound healing. In this study we address this issue by using a novel in vivo metho ... Full text Link to item Cite

Two-sex population dynamics in space: effects of gestation time on persistence.

Journal Article Theoretical population biology · September 2001 Most single-species population models assume either that one sex dominates the growth dynamics (usually the female), or that the life cycles of the two sexes are identical; however, sexual differences in ontogenetic features can render this assumption inva ... Full text Cite

Foraging trade-offs and resource patchiness: Theory and experiments with a freshwater snail community

Journal Article Ecology Letters · August 29, 2001 Empirical results concerning a freshwater snail community are interpreted using a two-species consumer model that incorporates resource structure. Behavioural-scale measurements on a guild of five species of freshwater pond snails (Mollusca: Pulmonata) ind ... Full text Cite

Evolution in a spatially structured population subject to rare epidemics.

Journal Article Physical review. E, Statistical, nonlinear, and soft matter physics · April 2001 We study a model that gives rise to spatially inhomogeneous population densities in a system of host individuals subject to rare, randomly distributed disease events. For stationary hosts that disperse offspring over short distances, evolutionary dynamics ... Full text Cite

Adaptive feeding across environmental gradients and its effect on population dynamics.

Journal Article Theoretical population biology · June 2000 This paper analyzes a consumer's adaptive feeding response to environmental gradients. We consider a consumer-resource system where resources are distributed among many discrete resource patches. Each consumer exhibits a feeding morphology allowing it to r ... Full text Cite

Population outbreaks in a discrete world.

Journal Article Theoretical population biology · March 2000 We present and analyze a simple three-patch host-parasitoid model where population growth is discrete. The model gives solutions that are qualitatively similar to the stable large-amplitude patterns in space found in reaction-diffusion theory. In the conte ... Full text Cite

Grazers and Diggers: Exploitation Competition and Coexistence among Foragers with Different Feeding Strategies on a Single Resource.

Journal Article The American naturalist · February 2000 A mathematical model is presented that describes a system where two consumer species compete exploitatively for a single renewable resource. The resource is distributed in a patchy but homogeneous environment; that is, all patches are intrinsically identic ... Full text Cite

Evolutionarily Stable Strategies for Consuming a Structured Resource.

Journal Article The American naturalist · January 2000 A general consumer-resource model assuming discrete consumers and a continuously structured resource is examined. We study two foraging behaviors, which lead to fixed and flexible patch residence times, in conjunction with a simple consumer energetics mode ... Full text Cite

Consuming and grouping: Resource-mediated animal aggregation

Journal Article Ecology Letters · January 1, 2000 We demonstrate that a simplistic foraging rule for a consumer in a spatially explicit resource environment leads to consumer grouping. Although consumer groups sweeping through the renewing resource environment represents the model's dynamical attractor, f ... Full text Cite

Ecology 101: Exploring Demographic Stochasticity

Journal Article Ecological Society of America Bulletin · 2000 Cite

Selection for intermediate mortality and reproduction rates in a spatially structured population.

Journal Article Proceedings. Biological sciences · December 1999 How local interactions influence both population and evolutionary dynamics is currently a key topic in theoretical ecology. We use a 'well-mixed' analytical model and spatially explicit individual-based models to investigate a system where a population is ... Full text Cite

Complementary foraging behaviors allow coexistence of two consumers

Journal Article Ecology · January 1, 1999 We developed a mathematical model based on the microalgal-gastropod system studied by Schmitt, in which two coexisting consumers (Tegula eisini and T. aureotincta) feed on a common resource. The two consumers differ in their foraging behavior and their abi ... Full text Cite

Stable pattern formation in tussock moth populations

Journal Article Journal of Animal Ecology · 1999 Cite

Exploring stable pattern formation in models of tussock moth populations

Journal Article Journal of Animal Ecology · January 1, 1999 1. The western tussock moth (Orgyia vetusta) at the University of California Bodega Marine Reserve (Sonoma County, California, USA) exhibits dense, localized populations in the midst of extensive habitats where variation in host plant quality or predator a ... Full text Cite

A clarification of pollen discounting and its joint effects with inbreeding depression on mating system evolution.

Journal Article The American naturalist · November 1998 Given the predominance of outcrossing by angiosperms, large costs must often overwhelm the genetic benefit of selfing derived from contributing two haploid genomes to each off-spring rather than one. In addition to the well-studied genetic cost of inbreedi ... Full text Cite

Pattern Formation and the Spatial Scale of Interaction between Predators and Their Prey.

Journal Article Theoretical population biology · April 1998 We study interactions of predators and prey that are characterized by a scale difference in their use of space. Prey are assumed to occupy patches, forming a metapopulation with low migration among patches. Predators are homogeneously distributed over thes ... Full text Cite

Resolving discrepancies between deterministic population models and individual-based simulations.

Journal Article The American naturalist · February 1998 This work ties together two distinct modeling frameworks for population dynamics: an individual-based simulation and a set of coupled integrodifferential equations involving population densities. The simulation model represents an idealized predator-prey s ... Full text Cite

Theoretical consequences of heterogeneous transport conditions for pollen dispersal by animals

Journal Article Ecology · January 1, 1998 Pollination governs a plant's mating options by establishing the diversity and intensity of male-gamete exchange between plants. For animal-pollinated plants, the pattern of pollen dispersal arises from the pollinator's interactions with floral organs duri ... Full text Cite

Discrete consumers, small scale resource heterogeneity, and population stability

Journal Article Ecology Letters · January 1, 1998 We present a consumer-resource model in which individual consumers subsist on a continuum of resource distributed over a very large number of small "bite-sized" patches, each patch being sufficiently small that all its resource is eaten whenever a consumer ... Full text Cite

Allocation to sexual versus nonsexual disease transmission.

Journal Article The American naturalist · January 1998 Many diseases have both sexual and nonsexual transmission routes, and closely related diseases often differ in their degree of sexual transmission. We investigate the evolution of transmission mode as a function of host social and mating structure using a ... Full text Cite

Cooperation and competition along smooth environmental gradients

Journal Article Ecology · January 1, 1997 This paper explores the ecological consequences of competition and cooperation, and the resultant abrupt species zonation that could occur along smooth environmental stress gradients. We present one- and two-species models of sessile organisms incorporatin ... Full text Cite

Primary-productivity gradients and short-term population dynamics in open systems

Journal Article Ecological Monographs · January 1, 1997 We present three models representing the trophic and behavioral dynamics of a simple food chain (primary producers, grazers, and predators) at temporal scales shorter than the scale of consumer reproduction, and at the spatial scales typically employed in ... Full text Cite

Theoretical perspectives on pollination

Journal Article Acta Horticulturae · 1997 Cite

Lotka's game in predator-prey theory: linking populations to individuals.

Journal Article Theoretical population biology · December 1996 This paper further examines an individual-based model of a spatially distributed predator-prey population that demonstrates strong spatial structuring in contrast with predictions from its representative analytic formulation. Examination of a small, locali ... Full text Cite

Abrupt population changes along smooth environmental gradients

Journal Article Bulletin of Mathematical Biology · January 1, 1996 Populations often exhibit abrupt changes in abundance associated with a smooth, continuous change in some component of their environment, with the abruptness usually attributed to inter-specific interactions or physical extremes. This paper presents a spat ... Full text Cite

Dynamics of age-structured predator-prey populations in space: Asymmetrical effects of mobility in juvenile and adult predators

Journal Article Oikos · January 1, 1996 In many natural predator-prey systems, there are differences in mobility between individual predators and prey. In this paper, we use individual-based models to examine how differences in mobility of age-structured predator populations affect the spatial a ... Full text Cite

Effect of dimensionality on Lotka-Volterra predator-prey dynamics: Individual based simulation results

Journal Article Bulletin of Mathematical Biology · January 1, 1995 The effect of varying habitat dimensionality on the dynamics of a model predator-prey system is examined using an individual-based simulation. The general results are that in one dimension fluctuations in abundance of prey and predators occur over a large ... Full text Cite

Floral evolution and male reproductive success: Optimal dispensing schedules for pollen dispersal by animal-pollinated plants

Journal Article Evolutionary Ecology · September 1, 1994 Selection favouring an outcrossing plant's ability to sire seeds generally promotes floral characters that increase (1) the frequency of pollinator visits, (2) the number of pollen grains dispersed to other plants by each pollinator and (3) the probability ... Full text Cite

Microscopic-based fluid flow simulation of invasion on a two-dimensional lattice. II. Mobilization and cohesion

Journal Article Journal of Statistical Physics · June 1, 1994 An algorithm for modeling secondary invasion processes in porous media is presented. Mobilization of trapped defender fluid is accomplished through interfacial interaction rules. Cohesive forces are also included within the defender phase. A series of simu ... Full text Cite

Residual statics estimation using the genetic algorithm

Journal Article Geophysics · January 1, 1994 The objective of this paper is to examine this algorithm's applicability to residual statics estimation and present three new ingredients that help the algorithm successfully resolve residual statics. These three ingredients include (1) breaking the popula ... Full text Cite

A lattice model of foam flow in porous media: A percolation approach

Journal Article Transport in Porous Media · May 1, 1993 Because fluid flow in porous media is opaque to most observational techniques simulations of the processes occurring in porous media have become important. Typical reservoir simulations treat the flow as taking place in some averaged (Darcy-scale) medium b ... Full text Cite

Dynamics of age-structured and spatially structured predator-prey interactions: individual-based models and population-level formulations

Journal Article American Naturalist · January 1, 1993 In the models, the individual is the fundamental unit, and the dynamics are governed by individual rules for growth, movement, reproduction, feeding, and mortality. The authors establish the congruence between age-structured predator-prey population models ... Full text Cite

Spatial instabilities within the diffusive lotka-volterra system: Individual-based simulation results

Journal Article Theoretical Population Biology · January 1, 1993 A predator-prey system is studied via an individual-based simulation technique involving discrete Lotka-Volterra-type predator and prey individuals occupying a two-dimensional lattice of up to 256 sites by 256 sites, encompassing up to 65,536 predators and ... Full text Cite

Microscopic-based fluid flow invasion simulations

Journal Article Journal of Statistical Physics · February 1, 1992 A microscopic method for the generation of invasion percolation structures using "armies" of interacting random walkers is presented. Two distinct species are used to simulate the invading and defending fluids of a fluid invasion process. Trapping of the d ... Full text Cite

Simulated annealing statics computation using an order-based energy function

Journal Article GEOPHYSICS · November 1, 1991 The residual statics problem in seismic data analysis is treated by introducing an optimization function that emphasizes the coherence of neighboring common depth point (CDP) gathers within a nonlinear simulated annealing technique. Emphasizing coherence b ... Full text Cite

Application of the genetic algorithm to residual statics estimation

Journal Article Geophysical Research Letters · January 1, 1991 We present an application of a genetics‐based optimization algorithm in an attempt to compute residual statics in seismic data processing. Genetic algorithms have a long history, but have only recently been applied to complex optimization problems. In this ... Full text Cite

Quenched dilution tricritical point in the q=3, d=4 Potts model

Journal Article Physics Letters A · May 29, 1989 The effects of quenched site and bond dilution in the three-dimensional three-state Potts model are studied via the microcanonical simulation. In both systems we observe the following picture as quenched dilutions are added: the line of first order phase t ... Full text Cite

q=5 Potts model on the quenched isotropically site-diluted square and Penrose lattices

Journal Article Physics Letters A · January 16, 1989 A microcanonical simulation of the q=5 Potts model on the quenched isotropically site-diluted square and Penrose lattices is performed. Analysis of the simulation data show a first-order phase transition which terminates at a critical point for dilutions i ... Full text Cite

Ferromagnetic q=4,5 Potts models on the two-dimensional Penrose and square lattices

Journal Article Physical Review B · January 1, 1989 The four- and five-state ferromagnetic Potts models are studied on both the periodic square lattice and the quasiperiodic Penrose lattice via the microcanonical simulation. Results presented here indicate that the four-state Potts model undergoes a second- ... Full text Cite

Q=5 Potts model on the quenched anisotropically site-diluted Penrose lattice

Journal Article Physical Review B · January 1, 1989 Anisotropic site dilution is introduced into the two-dimensional Penrose lattice by varying the seven-nearest-neighbor (7NN) site concentration p7 from zero (no 7NN sites) to one (all 7NN sites present). A first-order phase transition line is found for the ... Full text Cite

Fractal patterns of fluid domains for displacement processes in porous media

Journal Article Journal of Statistical Physics · November 1, 1988 Percolation invasion displacement of a compressible defender is examined for two cases: when only the smallest accessible site is entered at each step and when all accessible sites less than the size given by a reducing back pressure are entered at each ti ... Full text Cite

Evidence for universality of the potts model on the two-dimensional penrose lattice

Journal Article Physics Letters A · January 25, 1988 A microcanonical simulation of the four-state ferromagnetic Potts model on the two-dimensional Penrose lattice indicates that the phase transition is second order and is in the same universality class as the periodic system. The five-state ferromagnetic Po ... Full text Cite

Multilattice microcanonical simulation of the three-dimensional three-state Potts model

Journal Article Physical Review B · January 1, 1987 The three-state Potts model with nearest-neighbor ferromagnetic interactions on a three-dimensional simple cubic lattice is studied numerically by the multilattice microcanonical simulation. This simulation allows for the determination of the van der Waals ... Full text Cite

Multilattice microcanonical simulation

Journal Article Physics Letters A · November 10, 1986 A numerical lattice simulation technique is presented that is efficient for use on general purpose computers. This algorithm is a combination of the microcanonical simulation introduced by Creutz, and the multilattice coding technique demonstrated by Bhano ... Full text Cite