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Research group 'Applied Systems Science'

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Head: Professor Frank Hilker

Research profile

Our research group works on modeling environmental and ecological systems. These systems are experiencing a rapid rate of change, e.g. due to alterations in land and resource use, global mobility, pollution and climate change. If we are to effectively manage the emerging challenges and maintain the ecosystem services they provide, there is a pressing need to better understand how these systems respond to perturbations. Yet, environmental and eco-systems are complex and notoriously difficult to analyze.

Our work is interdisciplinary, at the interface of theoretical ecology, biogeochemistry, epidemiology, eco-toxicology, and applied maths. We use a variety of approaches, including mathematical modeling, tools from nonlinear dynamics and statistical physics, computer-based simulations, and data analysis.

Our research is "system-oriented". That is, we capture complicated system structures by focusing on selected components and their interactions with each other as well as with the environment. This allows us to identify and understand complex behavior that emerges from the interrelations of the system parts.

Current and ongoing research

• Regime shifts and early-warning signals
• Environmental flow requirements
• Modeling biocontrol and integrated pest management
• Species distribution and trophic interactions in streams and rivers
• Spatial population models for conservation biology
• Chaos control methods for stabilizing fluctuating populations
• Epidemiological modeling: the complexity of wildlife diseases
• Contamination of the aquatic environment by pharmaceuticals (MEDUWA)
• Microplastics in the environment
• Global mapping of current hydropower development
• Modeling the fate and behavior of chemical substances in surface waters (GREAT-ER)