• Class presentation

• Rules of thumb for judging ecological theories, by Ginzburg & Jensen: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0169534703003495
• The ecological literature, an idea-free distribution, by S. Scheimer: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ele.12196/full. A great editorial on the current state of theory in ecology.
• Kraenkel's career in Mathematical Biology Profiles from the SMB Newsletter: http://www.smb.org/publications/newsletter/bios.shtml
• Mathematics Is Biology's Next Microscope, Only Better; Biology Is Mathematics' Next Physics, Only Better , Joel Cohen: http://www.plosbiology.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pbio.0020439

Differential equations used to described population dynamics are in general of first order. In the book Ecological Orbits Lev Ginzburg and Mark Colyvan make a strong point that second-order equations bring out important insights on population dynamics. In a nutshell, they stress that acceleration should be modelled instead of velocities to fully understand how populations grow and decline.

Classical models of population dynamics assumes that the size of populations at different times are measurable. Two important issues here are:

As odd as it may sound, this is a difficult question for a huge proportion of living beings, like:

• Modular species, like corals and plants:
• Clonal species, like bacteria and protozoa: Sex and Death in Protozoa: the History of an Obsession, by Graham Bell.

• NIMBioS: National Institute for Mathematical and Biological Synthesis http://www.nimbios.org/