The effects of diffusion on the principal eigenvalue for age-structured models with random diffusion.

In this paper, we study the principal spectral theory of age-structured models with random diffusion. First, we provide an equivalent characteristic for the principal eigenvalue, the strong maximum principle and a positive strict super-solution. Then, we use the result to investigate the effects of diffusion rate on the principal eigenvalue. Finally, we study how the principal eigenvalue affects the global dynamics of the KPP model and verify that the principal eigenvalue being zero is a critical value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]