title: Residence times and boundary-following behavior in animals.
abstract: Many animals in heterogeneous environments bias their trajectories displaying a preference for the vicinity of boundaries. Here we propose a criterion, relying on recent invariance properties of residence times for microreversible Boltzmann's walks, that permits detecting and quantifying boundary-following behaviors. On this basis we introduce a boundary-following model that is a nonmicroreversible Boltzmann's walk and that can represent all kinds of boundary-following distributions. This allows us to perform a theoretical analysis of field-resolved boundary following in animals. Two consequences are pointed out and are illustrated: A systematic procedure can now be used for extraction of individual properties from experimental field measurements, and boundary-curvature influence can be recovered as an emerging property without the need for individuals perceiving the curvature via complex physiological mechanisms. The presented results apply to any memoryless correlated random walk, such as the run-and-tumble models that are widely used in cell motility studies.
authors.affiliation: Laboratoire Plasma et Conversion d'Energie, UMR-CNRS 5213, Université Paul Sabatier, Bâtiment 3R1, 118 Route de Narbonne, F-31062 Toulouse cedex 9, France and Laboratoire Plasma et Conversion d'Energie, CNRS, F-31062 Toulouse cedex 9, France and Zentrum für Informationsdienste und Hochleistungsrechnen, Technische Universität Dresden, Zellescher Weg 12, 01069 Dresden, Germany.
authors.forename: Sebastian
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Weitz
authors.affiliation: Laboratoire Plasma et Conversion d'Energie, UMR-CNRS 5213, Université Paul Sabatier, Bâtiment 3R1, 118 Route de Narbonne, F-31062 Toulouse cedex 9, France and Laboratoire Plasma et Conversion d'Energie, CNRS, F-31062 Toulouse cedex 9, France.
authors.forename: Stéphane
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Blanco
authors.affiliation: Laboratoire Plasma et Conversion d'Energie, UMR-CNRS 5213, Université Paul Sabatier, Bâtiment 3R1, 118 Route de Narbonne, F-31062 Toulouse cedex 9, France and Laboratoire Plasma et Conversion d'Energie, CNRS, F-31062 Toulouse cedex 9, France.
authors.forename: Richard
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Fournier
authors.affiliation: Centre de Recherches sur la Cognition Animale, UMR-CNRS 5169, Université Paul Sabatier, Bâtiment 4R3, 118 Route de Narbonne, F-31062 Toulouse cedex 9, France and CNRS, Centre de Recherches sur la Cognition Animale, F-31062 Toulouse cedex 9, France.
authors.forename: Jacques
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Gautrais
authors.affiliation: Centre de Recherches sur la Cognition Animale, UMR-CNRS 5169, Université Paul Sabatier, Bâtiment 4R3, 118 Route de Narbonne, F-31062 Toulouse cedex 9, France and CNRS, Centre de Recherches sur la Cognition Animale, F-31062 Toulouse cedex 9, France.
authors.forename: Christian
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Jost
authors.affiliation: Centre de Recherches sur la Cognition Animale, UMR-CNRS 5169, Université Paul Sabatier, Bâtiment 4R3, 118 Route de Narbonne, F-31062 Toulouse cedex 9, France and CNRS, Centre de Recherches sur la Cognition Animale, F-31062 Toulouse cedex 9, France.
authors.forename: Guy
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Theraulaz
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D008954:Models, Biological; D013037:Spatial Behavior; D013997:Time Factors