An application of fuzzy logic to build ecological sympatry networks

Autor: Marisol Flores, Andrés Torres-Miranda, Miguel Raggi, Víctor Hugo Anaya-Muñoz, Luis Miguel García-Velázquez, Daniele Colosi
Rok vydání: 2019
Předmět:
Zdroj: Ecological Informatics. 53:100978
ISSN: 1574-9541
DOI: 10.1016/j.ecoinf.2019.100978
Popis: In recent years sympatry networks have been proposed as a mean to perform biogeographic analysis, but their computation posed practical difficulties that limited their use. We propose a novel approach, bringing closer the application of well-established network analysis tools to the study of sympatry patterns using both geographic and environmental data associated with the occurrence of species. Our proposed algorithm, SG ra F u L o , combines the use of fuzzy logic and numerical methods to directly compute the network of interest from point locality records, without the need of specialized tools, such as geographic information systems, thereby simplifying the process for end users. By posing the problem in matrix terms, SG ra F u L o is able to achieve remarkable efficiency even for large datasets, taking advantage of well established scientific computing algorithms. We present sympatry networks constructed using real-world data collected in Mexico and Central America and highlight the potential of our approach in the analysis of overlapping niches of species that could have important applications even in evolutionary studies. We also present details on the design and implementation of the algorithm, as well as experiments that show its efficiency. The source code is freely released and datasets are also available to support the reproducibility of our results.
Databáze: OpenAIRE