Robust permanence for ecological equations with internal and external feedbacks

TL;DR

This paper develops a mathematical framework using Lyapunov functions and Morse decompositions to analyze the robust coexistence of species in ecological models with internal and external feedbacks, applicable to various complex ecological systems.

Contribution

It introduces a general theorem for robust permanence in ecological models with feedbacks, unifying and extending previous results to non-autonomous, structured, and eco-evolutionary models.

Findings

Provides necessary and sufficient conditions for coexistence.

Demonstrates applicability to non-autonomous and structured models.

Links results to previous feedback-specific models.

Abstract

Species experience both internal feedbacks with endogenous factors such as trait evolution and external feedbacks with exogenous factors such as weather. These feedbacks can play an important role in determining whether populations persist or communities of species coexist. To provide a general mathematical framework for studying these effects, we develop a theorem for coexistence for ecological models accounting for internal and external feedbacks. Specifically, we use average Lyapunov functions and Morse decompositions to develop sufficient and necessary conditions for robust permanence, a form of coexistence robust to large perturbations of the population densities and small structural perturbations of the models. We illustrate how our results can be applied to verify permanence in non-autonomous models, structured population models, including those with frequency-dependent feedbacks, and models of eco-evolutionary dynamics. In these applications, we discuss how our results relate to previous results for models with particular types of feedbacks.