Introduction
Complex systems arising in the real world often defy direct mathematical analysis or are difficult to measure in a comprehensive fashion. This is where computational models can provide key insight. This page holds links to examples of a number of problems for which insight can be gained through the use of simple computational models which have been implemented as Java applets to experiment with.
Fungal Growth
This applet
simulates a simple model of transport and growth in a fungal
hypha in one dimension.
Cultural hitchhiking
This applet demonstrates how a wave of advance
model can be used to simulate the spread of neolithic farming,
demonstrating also how cultural traits can "hitchhike" on the
back of technological advances.
Traffic Jams
Everyone's
been stuck in a traffic jam! A remarkably simple cellular
automata can provide a way to examine how jams form and
propagate.
Desert World
This applet investigates desert formation on a
model planet. This is a generalisation of the DaisyWorld
model used to study Lovelock's Gaia hypothesis.
Diffusion Limited Growth
This applet investigates metal deposition on a
substrate with or without the addition of a 'leveller'.
Limited Altruism
This applet
was developed to study the impact of limited altruistic
behaviour in a simple model ecosystem.
Ecosse
Ecosse is a
program which models food webs formed by predators and prey
with a representation of evolution.
Lotka-Volterra
This
applet demonstrates a (spatial) agent-based simulation of the
Lotka-Volterra equations.
Dictyostelium Discoideum
This applet was developed to study a simple cellular automaton
model of spiral waves in Dictyostelium Discoideum.
WebWorld
An example
applet for the WebWorld
model can be found on the NANIA pages of the Manchester
physics group.