Third session - Wednesday 11 March 2009

In this last session of the three-part short course on networks we explored methods for testing network hypotheses with dyadic (as opposed to vector) data. We discussed various kinds of network hypotheses, such as relational pattern predictions based on attributes, other relations and local network patterns. We introduced the notion of the triad census as a tool for testing local pattern hypotheses.

Finally, we showed WAND (Allesina and Bondavalli, 2004), a user-friendly tool to analyze networks of trophic exchanges in ecosystems and, more generally, all the webs that can be represented as weighted and directed (oriented) digraphs (e.g., the pipeline network responsible for the European natural gas delivery, the network describing monetary transfers between economic sectors in Hungary).

WAND (Windows Application for Network analysis Digraphs) is an open source software, and you can downaload it by using the link below:

WAND_download

Reference

Allesina, S., Bondavalli, C., 2004. WAND: An ecological network analysis user-friendly tool. Environmental Modelling and Software 19, 337-340