21.Feb.2011 [parameters] Wind Driven Fungal Dispersion

The resulting layered infection areas, hotspots, are a result of the ant path locations, wind speed and wind direction.  The ants paths of travel along the forest floor are abstracted as a field of random generated lines.   The initial small hotpsot boundaries are also scattered at random.  The initial hotspot boundaries are scaled in proportion to the quantity of ant paths that intersect the infected area.  This scaling is based on the fact that infected ant is directed by the fungus to return to the same area in which it was infected.  This scaling is also non-uniform.   The scaling vector is determined by the wind direction and velocity.  Hotspot boundaries are stretched from the upwind border directly downwind.  The magnitude of the stretch is proportional to the speed of the wind.  The large the wind during sporulation, the greater the area over which the new spores are seeded.  When two hotpsot boundaries intersect, a  boolean union takes place.  The center of the new boundary is estimated and 3rd order scaling acts upon this new boundaries from it’s new center.  In the current versions the scaling and union only occur twice after the intial conditions are set, but could be constructed to repeat as many time as liked.  The wind speed and direction data are imported from a Syracuse weather station via Pachube.

Close ups of each map MJ Wind Driven Quads.PDF

Grasshopper file MJ p2 pachube data.GHX