ArticlePLoS computational biology2021
Modelling locust foraging: How and why food affects group formation.
Article in PLoS computational biology, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 8 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
8 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- A systematic review of locust phase polyphenism: from proximate mechanisms to ecology and management.PeerJ · 2026Pooled it
- The Integrative Imperatives of Locust Phase Polyphenism Research: A Bibliometric Analysis.Integrative organismal biology (Oxford, England) · 2026Review
- Chase-and-Run and Chirality in Nonlocal Models of Pattern Formation.Bulletin of mathematical biology · 2025Article
- Aggregation-diffusion in heterogeneous environments.Journal of mathematical biology · 2025Article
- Including population and environmental dynamic heterogeneities in continuum models of collective behaviour with applications to locust foraging and group structure.PLoS computational biology · 2025Article
- A framework for modelling desert locust population dynamics and large-scale dispersal.PLoS computational biology · 2024Article
- Article
- Correction: Modelling locust foraging: How and why food affects group formation.PLoS computational biology · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
- Erratum issued
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Locusts are short horned grasshoppers that exhibit two behaviour types depending on their local population density. These are: solitarious, where they will actively avoid other locusts, and gregarious where they will seek them out. It is in this gregarious state that locusts can form massive and destructive flying swarms or plagues. However, these swarms are usually preceded by the aggregation of juvenile wingless locust nymphs. In this paper we attempt to understand how the distribution of food resources affect the group formation process. We do this by introducing a multi-population partial differential equation model that includes non-local locust interactions, local locust and food interactions, and gregarisation. Our results suggest that, food acts to increase the maximum density of locust groups, lowers the percentage of the population that needs to be gregarious for group formation, and decreases both the required density of locusts and time for group formation around an optimal food width. Finally, by looking at foraging efficiency within the numerical experiments we find that there exists a foraging advantage to being gregarious.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.