Abstract:

There is experimental evidence suggesting that search strategies followed by foraging animals is based in two different phases or displacement modes: a search phase, when the animal makes a local exploration and is able to find the target an motion phase, with fast displacement but with the animal unable to find the target. The switch between the phases is assumed random. The search phase is modelled as a "slow" diffusive displacement, while on the motion phase we assume a "fast " displacement. This problem is stated as a composite stochastic process and the mean time for the target detection is calculated. It is found that in this alternating scheme the mean detection time increments when an homogeneous spatial distribution of targets is assumed