Coagulation & Fragmentation Processes in Structured Population Models: Phytoplankton Dynamics

Fragmentation & Coagulations processes can be observed in natural sciences and engineering. To provide just a few examples we mention the study of stellar fragments in astrophysics, rock fracture, degradation of large polymer chains, DNA fragmentation, evolution of phytoplankton aggregates, liquid droplet breakup or breakup of solid drugs in organisms. In this monograph, a general mathematical framework for analyzing evolution equations arizing from fragmentation & coagulation models is provided. We investigate shattering in fragmentation models, develop and extend existing results. We provide global existing results for models with death and growth. In particular we consider nonlocal settings and discuss the dynamics of the phytoplankton biomass.