Using the Virtual Ecosystem#

The Virtual Ecosystem model is a complex simulation with many moving parts. It can be intimidating to get started with using the model, so these pages are intended to provide a step-by-step guide to getting up and running. The main sections are:

  1. Before you can run a Virtual Ecosystem simulation, you need to install the Python programming language and the Virtual Ecosystem Python package: see the section on installing the Virtual Ecosystem.

  2. The Virtual Ecosystem package includes a simple example simulation. Before trying to setup your own model, install the data to run the example model to learn about the structure of the files required to run a simulation in the Virtual Ecosystem.

  3. Once you have installed the Virtual Ecosystem package and the example model data, you should be able to run the example model to learn about how the model runs and learn about the model outputs.

  4. When it comes to running your own models, you will need to understand how to provide the required inputs to the Virtual Ecosystem model for your own system. There are three main parts to setting up your own model.

Advanced usage#

Once you have your own model running, you can run experiments on the system.

  1. Running modifications of your model, for example:

    • Develop new model configurations to run different scenarios within your virtual ecosystem. What happens if you remove a top predator? What happens with a 2°C increase in temperature?

    • Run models with different permutations of particular parameters to explore the sensitivity of your simulation to changes in the parameterisation.

    The Virtual Ecosystem provides a number of approaches to support running modified models.

  2. Isolate a single component of the model to see how it responds to constant inputs through time using the static model system. Although this is primarily intended as a model development tool, it can be useful to understand the details of how different components of your model are behaving.

Reference materials#

To help you understand how to setup, run, and analyse the behaviour of the Virtual Ecosystem we provide the following reference materials: