A mathematician uses math and ecology to try to solve the mystery of the Namibian fairy circles.&nbs
A mathematician uses math and ecology to try to solve the mystery of the Namibian fairy circles. In southern Africa’s Namib Desert, the sprawling grasslands are splotched with a set of spots. Fields of “fairy circles,” barren circles edged with patches of vegetation and ranging from 10 to 65 feet in diameter, stretch for hundreds of miles. They look otherworldly from satellite imagery on Google maps—local legend says that they were created by gods who left behind their footprints on the red earth. But the formation of the fairy circles have more to do with math and biology than folklore. What may look like a random arrangement may not be random at all.“The whole landscape looks like a polka dot dress,” says mathematician Corina Tarnita, who has studied the Namibian fairy circles closely. The dots are like islands in a sea of short grass that are “very, very regularly spaced.”Tarnita specializes in theoretical biology. She and her team at Princeton University find patterns in nature and create models to try to understand how all sorts of ecosystems organize themselves—from tree canopies to insect colonies to slime molds. For cases like Namibia’s fairy circles, areas might be too large to analyze the entire system or conduct experiments in the field. This makes it difficult to test multiple hypotheses, says Tarnita. Biologists and mathematicians have grappled over the mystery of the Namibian fairy circles for decades, proposing various mechanisms responsible for the strange pattern—from plant competition to termites. Read here to learn more about these mysterious fairy circles. Photos by Jen Guyton/jenguyton.com and Tyler Coverdale -- source link
#science#biology#desert#fairy circle#nature#south africa