Abstract
With the ever increasing computational power of computers, simulation-based approaches have become a feasible testing technique that does not require investing valuable resources to create an actual prototype. Thus, design changes can be introduced and design errors can be fixed before it is too late, making simulation a cheaper, safer and often more acceptable from an ethical perspective approach. In our paper we summarize the results from the analysis with the help of a computational simulation of a simple, yet analytically intractable problem scenario from the field of ecology. Our main goal is to confirm that even with a seemingly simple agent-based model and simulation, one could obtain plausible results regarding a system’s real life behavior. As a last point we propose a more efficient alternative for analysis, rather than the more expensive simulation.
Highlights
Simulation is a a well-known and wide-spread method of system analysis, and a lot of different branches in industry/science make use of them due to the various advantages that they offer
The obtained results did show similarities with real world population dynamics [2], e. g. predator overpopulation leads to the prey going extinct, vice versa with prey underpopulation and predators are more vulnerable than prey since they have to roam and search for food
By plotting the change in the population sizes over the course of the simulation, it was shown that despite the simplicity of the model, successful initial population size combinations result in the system reaching an equilibrium state, and the populations exhibiting dynamics like those described by the Lotka-Volterra-Model [11]
Summary
Simulation is a a well-known and wide-spread method of system analysis, and a lot of different branches in industry/science make use of them due to the various advantages that they offer. In some projects it is the most feasible approach with respect to effort-cost ratio, e.g. to simulate a space rover’s mission to another planet [15]. A welldesigned simulation can save time and money, and spare lives, for instance when conducting air-bag tests or in any experiments with living organisms. One could refer to the latter as ecological simulation, which has become quite popular recently due to the numerous environmental issues resulting from globalization and industrialization. With simulation means one could analyze the consequences of the resulting imbalance without involving actual animals and before it is too late
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have