Eric Westlund
Biography
Eric Westlund has been teaching in the Luther Mathematics Department since 2001. He has taught Calculus I with Review, Calculus II, Mathematical Reasoning & Writing, and Vector Calculus. His research is in algebraic topology and dynamical systems.
- Ph.D., Mathematics, University of Wisconsin-Madison
- M.A., Mathematics, University of Wisconsin-Madison
- B.A., Mathematics and Physics, St. Olaf College
- Hyperplane Arrangements
- Dynamical Systems
For a student-faculty collaborative research project, I worked with Stephen Becklin (’16) to develop a mathematical model for a predator-prey system with an infectious disease. We analyzed the qualitative behavior of the model using tools from dynamical systems and ran simulations with various parameter values to evaluate whether the behavior seemed realistic for the case of chronic wasting disease for deer under predation by wolves.
During summer 2017, Lorelle Behne (’19) compared the qualitative behavior of various discrete and continuous models of predator-prey dynamics.