Dynamics of prey-predator: effect of cooperative interaction and inertial forces*

A swarm of preys when attacked by a predator is known to rely on their cooperative interactions to escape. We present a simple theoretical model to investigate the effect of cooperative interactions on the survival chances of a prey group while chased by a predator. Our study shows that very short-range or very long-range interactions are not beneficial for preys to escape. However, in the intermediate range of interaction, an optimality criterion can be established where the survival probability of the prey group is maximum. We further explore the effect of inertial forces on the survival chances and escape trajectories of the prey group. Interestingly, we observe a transition from non-survival to survival of the prey group as a function of increasing predator mass. Our analysis also shows that prey group size and predator strength have an immense effect on this survival regime.

Reference: Chakraborty, D., Bhunia, S.,& De, R. (2019). Survival chances of a prey swarm: how the cooperative interaction range affects the outcome. arXiv preprint arXiv:1910.10541.

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