POPULATION-DYNAMIC INSTABILITY AS A CAUSE OF PATCH STRUCTURE

Understanding how ocean ecosystem dynamics are driven by the coupling of trophodynamic interactions and physical factors and how these affec t recruitment is one of the critical problems in biological oceanograp hy. This paper attempts to contribute insights into these interactions by defining a population-dynamic/physical-forcing space in which it m ay be possible to begin unification of historical work on trophic webs , functional responses, and patch structure. We use more or less tradi tional reaction-diffusion equations to facilitate exploration of prey- predator relative motion effects on spatial distributions. As a partic ular example, reparameterization of a nondimensionalized version of th e model applied to two kinds of trophodynamic interactions. allows con centration upon the role of diffusion-driven instability in generating spatial patch structures of prey and predator abundance.