Socio-environmental systems
The dynamic and two-way relationship between changing environments and cultural changes is the subject of our research topic "Socio-environmental systems". For our research, we integrate archaeological, social, ecological, climate, economic and demographic data, and we use optimality-oriented behavioral model approaches such as agent-based and trait-based models.
Synchronization of population growth and climate stability for Europe, modified from Wirtz et al. (2024). Graphics: Wirtz/Hereon
We're intrigued by the question of how much influence climate has had on human populations. We identified that population growth and climate variability are quite synchronized globally and continentally (Wirtz et al., Nature Communications 2024). We found that climate instabilities modulated the European wave of advance of first agriculture (Lemmen et al. 2014), and that the periodicities found in the climate system showed a marked shift around 6000 years ago (Wirtz et al. 2010). We could link the deurbanization of the Indus Valley Civilization around 3000 years ago rather to social dynamics than climate triggers (Lemmen & Khan 2012). We developed the first model that describes regionally resolved and global prehistoric demography, land use and technology and explained the differential onsets of agriculture/herding during the Holocene around the globe, which later led to very delivery trajectories of cultural and technological evolution (Wirtz & Lemmen 2003).
- Wirtz et al. 2024 ... Multicentennial cycles
- Lemmen, C. and K. W. Wirtz (2014): On the sensitivity of the simulated Neolithic transition in Europe to climate extremes. J. Archeol. Sci. 51, 65-72, doi:10.1016/j.jas.2012.10.023
- Lemmen C. and A. Khan (2012) Geophysi. Monogr. Ser. 198, 107-114, doi:10.1029/2012GM001217
- Wirtz, K. W. and C. Lemmen (2003): A Global Dynamic Model for the Neolithic Transition. Climatic Change 59 (3), 333-367, doi:10.1023/A:1024858532005
Interactive simulator of the German coastal shrimp fishery. Graphics: Lemmen/Hereon
Coastal fisheries, and prominently the German shrimp fishery, are facing regulatory impediments to traditional operations, primarily from nature protection and offshore energy production. We built an interactive simulator for exploring scenarios of mitigation and adaption in shrimp fisheries (Lemmen et al. 2024). With this model, we will investigate the viability of this sector considering area closures, target and habitat shifts, and self-regulation pathways.
Forecasted SARS-CoV2 pandemic fatalities 2021-2022 contrasting a predictive model versus data (modified from Wirtz 2022). Graphics: Wirtz/Hereon
Trade-offs governed regulation and individual behaviour during the SARS-CoV2 pandemic. We formulated a model on social distancing emerging from choices accepting contraction of the disease versus accepting changes to ones lifestyle and could reliably predict for many regions of the world their mobility and mortality (Wirtz 2021).