We evaluate a mathematical model of the predator-prey population dynamics in a fragmented habitat where both migration processes between habitat patches and prey control policies are taken into account. The considered system is examined by applying the aggregation method and different dynamical scenarios are generated. The resulting implications are then discussed, their primary aim being the conservation of the wolf population in the Alta Murgia National Park, a protected area situated in the Apulian Foreland and also part of the Natura 2000 network.

The inverse problem of MEG aims at estimating electromagnetic cerebral activity from measurements of the magnetic fields outside the head. After formulating the problem within the Bayesian framework, a hierarchical conditionally Gaussian prior model is introduced, including a physiologically inspired prior model that takes into account the preferred directions of the source currents. The hyperparameter vector consists of prior variances of the dipole moments, assumed to follow a non-conjugate gamma distribution with variable scaling and shape parameters.

In the framework of variable exponent Sobolev spaces, we prove that the variational eigenvalues defined by inf sup procedures of Rayleigh ratios for the Luxemburg norms are all stable under uniform convergence of the exponents. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Beside geographical and physical characteristics of the environment, mostly temperature changes drive glacier dynamical evolution with subglacial and supraglacial water release or approaching a metastable state. The appearance of subglacial lakes filling bedrock depressions, glacier sliding, crevasses formation and calving are linked climate change sensitive macro-phenomena, where interactions between the interfacing phases are crucial. We shall discuss the mathematical modelling and the numerical simulation of one of the above glacier problems with moving boundary. References A.

We examine spatially explicit models described by reaction-diffusion partial differential equations for the study of predator-prey population dynamics. The numerical methods we propose are based on the coupling of a finite difference/element spatial discretization and a suitable partitioned Runge-Kutta scheme for the approximation in time. The RK scheme here implemented uses an implicit scheme for the stiff diffusive term and a partitioned RK symplectic scheme for the reaction term (IMSP schemes).

A discrete Boltzmann model (DBM) is developed to investigate the hydrodynamic and thermodynamic non-equilibrium (TNE) effects in phase separation processes. The interparticle force drives changes and the gradient force, induced by gradients of macroscopic quantities, opposes them. In this paper, we investigate the interplay between them by providing a detailed inspection of various non-equilibrium observables. Based on the TNE features, we define TNE strength which roughly estimates the deviation amplitude from the thermodynamic equilibrium.

A novel, coarse-grained, single-framework 'Eulerian' model for blood flow in the microvascular circulation is presented and used to estimate the variations in flow properties that accrue from all of the following: (i) wall position variation, associated with the endothelial cells' (ECs) shape, (ii) glycocalyx layer (GL) effects and (iii) the particulate nature of blood. We stress that our new model is fully coupled and uses only a single Eulerian computational framework to recover complex effects, dispensing altogether with the need for, e.g. re-meshing and advected sets of Lagrangian points.

We introduce a new class of finite differences schemes to approximate one dimensional dissipative semilinear hyperbolic systems with a BGK structure. Using precise analytical time-decay estimates of the local truncation error, it is possible to design schemes, based on the standard upwind approximation, which are increasingly accurate for large times when approximating small perturbations of constant asymptotic states. Numerical tests show their better performances with respect to those of other schemes.