Comparison of Probabilistic and Stochastic Formulations in Modeling Growth Uncertainty and Variability

We compare two approaches for inclusion of uncertainty/variability in modeling growth in size-structured population models. One entails imposing a probabilistic structure on growth rates in the population while the other involves formulating growth as a stochastic Markov diffusion process. We present a theoretical analysis that allows one to include comparable levels of uncertainty in the two distinct formulations in making comparisons of the two approaches.