Can principles of biogeography lead to the location of Osama bin Laden?  Two professors of geography at UCLA (one of whom was my office mate during graduate school) along with some undergraduates believe so.  In a paper published in MIT’s International Review entitled “Finding bin Laden“, Thomas Gillespie and John Agnew lay out using the theories of distance-decay theory, island biogeography theory, and life history characteristics along with remote sensing to pinpoint the probable location of Osama bin Laden.  From UCLA’s press release:

 We believe our work represents the first scientific approach to establishing bin Laden’s current location,” said John A. Agnew, study co-author and UCLA geography professor. “The methods are repeatable and could easily be updated with new information obtained by the U.S. intelligence community.”

The theories of distance-decay and island biogeography were used to isolate the general area where bin Laden could be island.  Then information about his height, medical requirements and personal needs was used to filter out thousands of buidings to identify probable buildings where he could be hiding.

The locational information used in the study is dated and only pinpoints the probable location of Osama bin Laden at the end of 2001. 

Read more:

• Finding bin Laden (PDF) – MIT International Review
• UCLA geographers urge U.S. to search 3 structures in Pakistan for bin Laden – UCLA Press Release