Successful Nova Week at Hebrew University of Jerusalem

During the first week of February, 2014, Wayne Getz, Richard Salter, and Nicolas Sippl-Swezey taught a workshop at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem on using Nova to model movement and population growth. The five-day intensive course merged theory lectures and hands-on exercises with Nova. By the end of the workshop, participants learned how to use Nova”s new CellNetwork container to model processes that take place within square and hexagonal networks, and how the Perceptron plug-in can be used to add artificial neural network classifiers to a cellular automata model to study optimal movement pathways over heterogeneous landscapes containing resources, competitors and enemies. These sophisticated movement models are at forefront of movement ecology, and have only recently become available to non-programmers thanks to Nova”s sophisticated modeling palette and user-friendly graphical environment.