Arts & Sciences Events

Title: Early warning signals of extinction: A role for algebraic topology in ecological forecasting

Many populations and ecosystems are experiencing decline due to habitat degradation, global climate change, and increasing human pressures such as overfishing. Populations undergoing decline can experience a critical transition - an abrupt, irreversible shift in the dynamics of the population. It is particularly challenging to detect critical transitions in spatial populations, e.g., a grassland. Here, we use computational algebraic topology to quantify features in a landscape and observe how those features change over time during a critical transition such as an extinction event. In this way, we identify topological signatures of impending population collapse.