Sensitivity Analysis: Matrix Methods in Demography and Ecology

Hal Caswell is a mathematical demographer and ecologist specializing in matrix models for populations. He has a long association with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, and is now Professor of Mathematical Demography and Ecology at the University of Amsterdam. His research interests include the theory of matrix population models and their applications to evolutionary demography, conservation and the effects of climate change, health demography, lifetime reproductive output and fertility, and the interaction of stochasticity and heterogeneity in populations. In addition to his work on humans, he has studied the demography of polar bears, penguins, nematodes, and terrestrial plants. Much of this work involves sensitivity analysis, the topic of this volume.Caswell has been recognized by numerous international awards and fellowships in both human demography and ecology. He is the author of Matrix Population Models (2nd edition, Sinauer Associates, 2001) and co-author with the late Nathan Keyfitz of Applied Mathematical Demography (3rd edition, Springer-Verlag).

• I Introductory and methodological: 1 Introduction. Sensitivity analysis: what and why?.- 2 Matrix calculus and notation.- II Linear models: 3 The sensitivity of population growth rate: three approaches.- 4 Sensitivity analysis of longevity and life disparity.- 5 Individual stochasticity and implicit age dependence.- 6 Age[1]stage-classified models.- III Time-varying and stochastic models: 7 Transient population dynamics.- 8 Periodic models.- 9 LTRE decomposition of the stochastic growth rate.- IV Nonlinear models: 10 Sensitivity analysis of nonlinear demographic models.- V Markov chains: 11 Sensitivity analysis of discrete Markov chains.- 12 Sensitivity analysis of continuous Markov chains.