title: Applicability of the Fisher equation to bacterial population dynamics.
abstract: The applicability of the Fisher equation, which combines diffusion with logistic nonlinearity, to population dynamics of bacterial colonies is studied with the help of explicit analytic solutions for the spatial distribution of a stationary bacterial population under a static mask. The mask protects bacteria from ultraviolet light. The solution, which is in terms of Jacobian elliptic functions, is used to provide a practical prescription to extract Fisher equation parameters from observations and to decide on the validity of the Fisher equation.
authors.affiliation: Consortium of the Americas for Interdisciplinary Science and Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87131, USA.
authors.forename: V M
authors.initials: VM
authors.lastname: Kenkre
authors.forename: M N
authors.initials: MN
authors.lastname: Kuperman
mesh_terms: D001419:Bacteria / Q000378:metabolism; D018407:Bacterial Physiological Phenomena; D055592:Biophysical Phenomena; D001703:Biophysics; D015233:Models, Statistical; D014466:Ultraviolet Rays