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The Weierstrassian movement patterns of snails

Weierstrassian Lévy walks are the archetypical form of random walk that do not satisfy the central limit theorem and are instead characterized by scale invariance. They were originally regarded as a mathematical abstraction but subsequent theoretical studies showed that they can, in principle, at le...

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Autores principales: Reynolds, Andy, Santini, Giacomo, Chelazzi, Guido, Focardi, Stefano
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: The Royal Society Publishing 2017
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5493898/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28680656
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.160941
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author Reynolds, Andy
Santini, Giacomo
Chelazzi, Guido
Focardi, Stefano
author_facet Reynolds, Andy
Santini, Giacomo
Chelazzi, Guido
Focardi, Stefano
author_sort Reynolds, Andy
collection PubMed
description Weierstrassian Lévy walks are the archetypical form of random walk that do not satisfy the central limit theorem and are instead characterized by scale invariance. They were originally regarded as a mathematical abstraction but subsequent theoretical studies showed that they can, in principle, at least, be generated by chaos. Recently, Weierstrassian Lévy walks have been found to provide accurate representations of the movement patterns of mussels (Mytilus edulis) and mud snails (Hydrobia ulvae) recorded in the laboratory under controlled conditions. Here, we tested whether Weierstrassian Lévy walks and chaos are present under natural conditions in intertidal limpets Patella vulgata and P. rustica, and found that both characteristics are pervasive. We thereby show that Weierstrassian Lévy walks may be fundamental to how molluscs experience and interact with the world across a wide range of ecological contexts. We also show in an easily accessible way how chaos can produce a wide variety of Weierstrassian Lévy walk movement patterns. Our findings support the Lévy flight foraging hypothesis that posits that because Lévy walks can optimize search efficiencies, natural selection should have led to adaptations for Lévy walks.
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spelling pubmed-54938982017-07-05 The Weierstrassian movement patterns of snails Reynolds, Andy Santini, Giacomo Chelazzi, Guido Focardi, Stefano R Soc Open Sci Biology (Whole Organism) Weierstrassian Lévy walks are the archetypical form of random walk that do not satisfy the central limit theorem and are instead characterized by scale invariance. They were originally regarded as a mathematical abstraction but subsequent theoretical studies showed that they can, in principle, at least, be generated by chaos. Recently, Weierstrassian Lévy walks have been found to provide accurate representations of the movement patterns of mussels (Mytilus edulis) and mud snails (Hydrobia ulvae) recorded in the laboratory under controlled conditions. Here, we tested whether Weierstrassian Lévy walks and chaos are present under natural conditions in intertidal limpets Patella vulgata and P. rustica, and found that both characteristics are pervasive. We thereby show that Weierstrassian Lévy walks may be fundamental to how molluscs experience and interact with the world across a wide range of ecological contexts. We also show in an easily accessible way how chaos can produce a wide variety of Weierstrassian Lévy walk movement patterns. Our findings support the Lévy flight foraging hypothesis that posits that because Lévy walks can optimize search efficiencies, natural selection should have led to adaptations for Lévy walks. The Royal Society Publishing 2017-06-07 /pmc/articles/PMC5493898/ /pubmed/28680656 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.160941 Text en © 2017 The Authors. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Published by the Royal Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/, which permits unrestricted use, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Biology (Whole Organism)
Reynolds, Andy
Santini, Giacomo
Chelazzi, Guido
Focardi, Stefano
The Weierstrassian movement patterns of snails
title The Weierstrassian movement patterns of snails
title_full The Weierstrassian movement patterns of snails
title_fullStr The Weierstrassian movement patterns of snails
title_full_unstemmed The Weierstrassian movement patterns of snails
title_short The Weierstrassian movement patterns of snails
title_sort weierstrassian movement patterns of snails
topic Biology (Whole Organism)
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5493898/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28680656
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.160941
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