Evolution in the Face of Spatial Heterogeneity

Aim: Explore the effects of landscape structure and application of crop protection on the evolutionof resistance to pesticides

Background: The evolution of pesticide resistance is one of the main issues faced by agricultural practice throughout the world. The ability of the industry's Research & Development engines to generate new products has not managed to keep up with the rate in which pests develop resistance. Understanding the effect of landscape structure and temporal use of pesticides will bring insight into resistance management strategies.

Project: The project will investigate how landscape structure and use of pesticides influence the evolution of resistance. To achieve this goal, extensive simulations and theoretical work assuming simplified models for the spread of pests and evolution of resistance will be used. These findings will be combined with detailed models capturing most of the complexity of selected pests and crop protection agents. We anticipate that the results can be used to develop optimisation routines to identify landscapes and application schemes of crop protection agents that hinder resistance evolution and mitigate its consequences.