Nonlinear plankton dynamics and pattern formation in an ecohydrodynamic model system

Nonlinear interactions, diffusion, transport and locomotion of species are described by a system of reaction-diffusion-advection equations. Its transient and stationary nonequilibrium solutions in space and time are considered as patchy patterns in natural chemical or biological communities. Recent results on the general mechanism of spatial pattern formation after flux-induced instabilities of a spatially uniform species distribution as well as on the effect of hydrodynamic forcing on spatial patterns in a minimal plankton model are summarized.