title: Impact of dispersal on the stability of metapopulations.
abstract: Dispersal is a key ecological process that enables local populations to form spatially extended systems called metapopulations. In the present study, we investigate how dispersal affects the linear stability of a general single-species metapopulation model. We discuss both the influence of local within-patch dynamics and the effects of various dispersal behaviours on stability. We find that positive density-dependent dispersal and positive density-dependent settlement are destabilizing dispersal behaviours while negative density-dependent dispersal and negative density-dependent settlement are stabilizing. It is also shown that dispersal has a stabilizing impact on heterogeneous metapopulations that correlates positively with the number of patches and the connectance of metapopulation networks.
authors.affiliation: University of Bristol, Merchant Venturers School of Engineering, Bristol, UK. Electronic address: eric.tromeur@ens-lyon.fr.
authors.forename: Eric
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Tromeur
authors.affiliation: University of Bristol, Merchant Venturers School of Engineering, Bristol, UK.
authors.forename: Lars
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Rudolf
authors.affiliation: University of Bristol, Merchant Venturers School of Engineering, Bristol, UK.
authors.forename: Thilo
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Gross
mesh_terms: D008954:Models, Biological; D011157:Population Dynamics
keywords: Density-dependent dispersal; Density-dependent settlement; Generalized modelling; Network topology