Coral Growth via Nutrient Random Walk By Steve Shen

Assumptions Method Coastal marine organism dependent on nutrients and sunlight Nutrients diffuse in system via random walk. Coral polyp grows when it has received a certain amount of nutrients. Polyps have a tendency to grow in the direction of the nutrients Only polyps on the surface participate. Coral can grow at all depths of the system. 2D For nParticles while 1 nutrients diffuse w/o PBC if neighbor has coral, stop diffusion and add nutrients to cell. break from while loop Check coral cell that stopped the diffusion if sum of nutrients around that cell > threshold, grow a coral new image end

Run with FinalCoralGrowth.m

Comparison with Standard DLA No PBC More aggressive branching Self-directed ‘flow’ behavior ‘Fixed’; % Starting point of nutrient diffusion x = 3+floor((maxX-2)*rand); Demonstrates aggressive sensitivity to small changes % Starting point of nutrient diffusion x = 3+floor((maxX)*rand);