Motivated by the discovery of 'loglet analysis' (http://phe.rockefeller.edu/LogletLab/) that allows one to decompose growth curves into a series of logistic equations, I attempted to do the same thing in R. SIMULATED DATA Time <- 1:200 pop.size <- SSlogis(Time,10,20,5) + SSlogis(Time,20,100,20) + rnorm(length(Time)) MY ANALYSIS results <- nls(size ~ SSlogis(Time, Asym1, xmid1, scal1) + SSlogis(Time, Asym2, xmid2, scal2), start = list(Asym1=5, xmid1=15, scal1=30, Asym2=25, xmid2=67, scal2=25)) THE RESULT I get the error message: Error in nls(size ~ SSlogis(Time, Asym1, xmid1, scal1) + SSlogis(Time, : step factor 0.000488281 reduced below `minFactor' of 0.000976563 Assistance in doing this analysis would be much appreciated. Dan Bebber ____________________________ Dr. Daniel P. Bebber Department of Plant Sciences University of Oxford South Parks Road Oxford OX1 3RB Tel. 01865 275060 Web. http://www.forestecology.co.uk/ "Data, data, data!" he cried impatiently. "I can't make bricks without clay" - Sherlock Holmes, The Adventure of the Copper Beeches, 1892