Date Thesis Awarded
7-2012
Access Type
Honors Thesis -- Access Restricted On-Campus Only
Degree Name
Bachelors of Science (BS)
Department
Mathematics
Advisor
Junping Shi
Committee Members
Robert Michael Lewis
Leah B. Shaw
Romuald Lipcius
Abstract
During the last century, the oyster population of the Chesapeake Bay area has diminished greatly due to overfishing, pollution and climate change. Our Optimal Control model finds a sustainable solution that balances oyster harvesting with the health of the population. We wish to find the value of our Effort (control) function that harvests the most oysters possible without fishing the population to extinction. We create a Hamiltonian function and apply Bang-Bang Control in order to find a singular E* between 0 and Emax such that E* will balance out with the natural growth rate of the population to form a constant, stable population. Our model uses analytical and numerical solutions to determine the optimal sustainable population N* and E* for a Bang-Bang Control model. The analytical model also solves for times T1 and T2 at which the piecewise Heaviside eff ort function switches values of E(t). In marine population study, there has not been extensive use of mathematics, especially optimal control theory. Consequently, as seen in our Future Work section, there is much room for expansion upon current scholarship regarding optimal control theory. Only by incorporating several environmental factors can one succeed in using mathematics to develop a successful harvesting strategy.
Recommended Citation
McDade, Timothy Raymond, "Analysis and Simulation of an Optimal Control Model of an Oyster Population Displaying an Allee Effect" (2012). Undergraduate Honors Theses. William & Mary. Paper 499.
https://scholarworks.wm.edu/honorstheses/499
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication 1.0 License.
Comments
Thesis is part of Honors ETD pilot project, 2008-2013. Migrated from Dspace in 2016.