Related papers: Mortality, Redundancy, and Diversity in Stochastic…
Evolutionary search via the quality-diversity (QD) paradigm can discover highly performing solutions in different behavioural niches, showing considerable potential in complex real-world scenarios such as evolutionary robotics. Yet most QD…
In this paper, we consider the dynamics of a 2D target-searching agent performing Brownian motion under the influence of fluid shear flow and chemical attraction. The analysis is motivated by numerous situations in biology where these…
We study a protein-DNA target search model with explicit DNA dynamics applicable to in vitro experiments. We show that the DNA dynamics plays a crucial role for the effectiveness of protein "jumps" between sites distant along the DNA…
We study a multi-objective model on the allocation of reusable resources under model uncertainty. Heterogeneous customers arrive sequentially according to a latent stochastic process, request for certain amounts of resources, and occupy…
Quantifying how spatial disorder affects the movement of a diffusing particle or agent is fundamental to target search studies. When diffusion occurs on a network, that is on a highly disordered environment, we lack the mathematical tools…
An individual-based model of stochastic branching is proposed and studied, in which point particles drift in $\bar{\mathds{R}}_{+}:=[0,+\infty)$ towards the origin (edge) with unit speed, where each of them splits into two particles that…
Stochastic models of diffusion are routinely used to study dispersal of populations, including populations of animals, plants, seeds and cells. Advances in imaging and field measurement technologies mean that data are often collected across…
Active search is a setting in adaptive experimental design where we aim to uncover members of rare, valuable class(es) subject to a budget constraint. An important consideration in this problem is diversity among the discovered targets --…
We study numerically and analytically a stochastic group selection model in which a population of asexually reproducing individuals, each of which can be either altruist or non-altruist, is subdivided into $M$ reproductively isolated groups…
Protein complexes involved in DNA mismatch repair appear to diffuse along dsDNA in order to locate a hemimethylated incision site via a dissociative mechanism. Here, we study the probability that these complexes locate a given target site…
A new stochastic method for describing mortality is proposed and explored. It is based on differences of observed times series of the transform $\log(-\log x)$ of survival probabilities which seem to follow simple patterns over the years.…
We study a generalized binary search problem on the line and general trees. On the line (e.g., a sorted array), binary search finds a target node in $O(\log n)$ queries in the worst case, where $n$ is the number of nodes. In situations with…
This paper studies the sample complexity of searching over multiple populations. We consider a large number of populations, each corresponding to either distribution P0 or P1. The goal of the search problem studied here is to find one…
Epochal dynamics, in which long periods of stasis in an evolving population are punctuated by a sudden burst of change, is a common behavior in both natural and artificial evolutionary processes. We analyze the population dynamics for a…
Survival analysis studies and predicts the time of death, or other singular unrepeated events, based on historical data, while the true time of death for some instances is unknown. Survival trees enable the discovery of complex nonlinear…
This paper presents an investigation of two search techniques, tabu search (TS) and simulated annealing (SA), to assess their relative merits when applied to engineering design optimisation. Design optimisation problems are generally…
Limited Discrepancy Search (LDS) is a popular algorithm to search a state space with a heuristic to order the possible actions. Nested Search (NS) is another algorithm to search a state space with the same heuristic. NS spends more time on…
We present an explicit unified stochastic model of fluctuations in population size due to random birth, death, density-dependent competition and environmental fluctuations. Stochastic dynamics provide insight into small populations,…
We study the stochastic evolution of four species in cyclic competition in a well mixed environment. In systems composed of a finite number $N$ of particles these simple interaction rules result in a rich variety of extinction scenarios,…
Understanding whether a population will survive and flourish or become extinct is a central question in population biology. One way of exploring this question is to study population dynamics using reaction-diffusion equations, where…