Date of Award

5-2014

Degree Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Mathematics and Statistics

Committee Chair(s)

Luis Gordillo

Committee

Luis Gordillo

Committee

Jim Powell

Committee

Frank Caliendo

Abstract

With an application of the sterile insect technique, it is our goal to know the optimal rate of production of sterile males in order to control an insect pest invasion and protect crops. Starting with a fundametal relationship between costs of production and feeding rates, we construct an objective functional. We then use the relationships between the dierent stages of female reproduction to build the state equations. Once, we have dened the optimal control problem, we use the simulated annealing algorithm to determine the amount of sterile males to be released at each discrete time event. Multiple calculations are made with dierent release schedules.

Included in

Mathematics Commons

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