Infectious Disease Ecology And Conservation

Emerging infectious diseases pose an increasingly serious threat to a number of endangered or sensitive species and are increasingly recognized as one of the major factors driving species extinction. Despite the significant impact of pathogens on conservation, no single book has yet integrated the theoretical principles underlying disease transmission with the practical health considerations for helping wildlife professionals and conservation biologists to manage disease outbreaks and conserve biodiversity. This novel and accessible book starts with a foundational section focusing on the role of pathogens in natural ecosystems, the dynamics of transmission in different environments, and the factors driving wildlife disease outbreaks. It then moves on to more applied issues concerned with the acquisition of field data including sampling, experimental design and analysis, as well as diagnostic analyses in both the laboratory and field. Guidelines for effective modelling and data analysis follow, before a final section is devoted to disease prevention and control including the prevention of novel outbreaks, the use of diseases as biocontrol agents, and the associated issues of ethics, public communication, and outreach. Infectious Disease Ecology and Conservation is primarily aimed at advanced undergraduates, graduate students, and established researchers in the fields of conservation biology, disease ecology, population ecology, and veterinary science. It will also be a valuable reference for conservation practitioners, land managers, and wildlife professionals who are required to deal with disease outbreak problems.

Emerging infectious diseases pose an increasingly serious threat to a number of endangered or sensitive species and are increasingly recognized as one of the major factors driving species extinction. Despite the significant impact of pathogens on conservation, no single book has yet integrated the theoretical principles underlying disease transmission with the practical health considerations for helping wildlife professionals and conservation biologists to manage disease outbreaks and conserve biodiversity. This novel and accessible book starts with a foundational section focusing on the role of pathogens in natural ecosystems, the dynamics of transmission in different environments, and the factors driving wildlife disease outbreaks. It then moves on to more applied issues concerned with the acquisition of field data including sampling, experimental design and analysis, as well as diagnostic analyses in both the laboratory and field. Guidelines for effective modelling and data analysis follow, before a final section is devoted to disease prevention and control including the prevention of novel outbreaks, the use of diseases as biocontrol agents, and the associated issues of ethics, public communication, and outreach. Infectious Disease Ecology and Conservation is primarily aimed at advanced undergraduates, graduate students, and established researchers in the fields of conservation biology, disease ecology, population ecology, and veterinary science. It will also be a valuable reference for conservation practitioners, land managers, and wildlife professionals who are required to deal with disease outbreak problems.

Birds are the most diverse group of land vertebrates and have evolved to exploit almost every terrestrial niche on earth. They also serve as a natural reservoir for an array of different pathogens that pose serious health risks to human and domestic animal populations, including West Nile virus, highly pathogenic avian influenza viruses, Newcastle Disease virus, and numerous enteric pathogens. Avian diseases are also critically important to the conservation of endemic bird species in many places around the world. This accessible textbook focuses on the dynamics of infectious diseases for wild avian hosts across every level of ecological hierarchy, from the way pathogens interact with the physiology and behavior of individual hosts, the evolutionary and ecological dynamics of the host-parasite interactions occurring within populations, up to the complex biotic and abiotic interactions occurring within biological communities and ecosystems. Parasite-bird interactions are also increasingly occurring in rapidly changing global environments - thus, their ecology is also changing - and this shapes the complex ways by which parasites influence the inter-connected health of birds, humans, and shared ecosystems. Given the key role of birds in ecological communities more broadly, and as the primary host to so many zoonotic pathogens, an understanding of the ecological and evolutionary principles underlying the maintenance, amplification, transmission, and dispersal of these infectious agents is crucial to understanding how to mitigate the negative global impacts of the ever-increasing number of emerging infectious diseases. Although the topics and principles discussed in this book relate to birds, they have a far wider relevance and can also be applied to non-avian, wildlife host-pathogen systems. The COVID-19 pandemic has shown that understanding of disease ecology in wild animal populations is paramount to global health. Infectious Disease Ecology of Wild Birds is suitable for both senior undergraduate and graduate students taking courses in avian disease ecology, ecoimmunology, ecology, and conservation. It will also appeal to the many professional parasitologists, ecoimmunologists, ornithologists, behavioural ecologists, conservation biologists, and wildlife biologists requiring a concise overview of the topic.

Introduces readers to key case studies that illustrate how theory and data can be integrated to understand wildlife disease ecology.

Summary: The chapters in this book llustrate aspects of communityy ecology that influence pathogen transmission rates and disease dynamics in a wide variety of study systems.

News headlines are forever reporting diseases that take huge tolls on humans, wildlife, domestic animals, and both cultivated and native plants worldwide. These diseases can also completely transform the ecosystems that feed us and provide us with other critical benefits, from flood control to water purification. And yet diseases sometimes serve to maintain the structure and function of the ecosystems on which humans depend. Gathering thirteen essays by forty leading experts who convened at the Cary Conference at the Institute of Ecosystem Studies in 2005, this book develops an integrated framework for understanding where these diseases come from, what ecological factors influence their impacts, and how they in turn influence ecosystem dynamics. It marks the first comprehensive and in-depth exploration of the rich and complex linkages between ecology and disease, and provides conceptual underpinnings to understand and ameliorate epidemics. It also sheds light on the roles that diseases play in ecosystems, bringing vital new insights to landscape management issues in particular. While the ecological context is a key piece of the puzzle, effective control and understanding of diseases requires the interaction of professionals in medicine, epidemiology, veterinary medicine, forestry, agriculture, and ecology. The essential resource on the subject, Infectious Disease Ecology seeks to bridge these fields with an ecological approach that focuses on systems thinking and complex interactions.

A combination of ecology and epidemiology in natural, unmanaged, animal and plant populations.

Whether through loss of habitat or cascading community effects, diseases can shape the very nature of the marine environment. Despite their significant impacts, studies of marine diseases have tended to lag behind their terrestrial equivalents, particularly with regards to their ecological effects. However, in recent decades global research focused on marine disease ecology has expanded at an accelerating rate. This is due in part to increases in disease emergence across many taxa, but can also be attributed to a broader realization that the parasites responsible for disease are themselves important members of marine communities. Understanding their ecological relationships with the environment and their hosts is critical to understanding, conserving, and managing natural and exploited populations, communities, and ecosystems. Courses on marine disease ecology are now starting to emerge and this first textbook in the field will be ideally placed to serve them. Marine Disease Ecology is suitable for graduate students and researchers in the fields of marine disease ecology, aquaculture, fisheries, veterinary science, evolution and conservation. It will also be of relevance and use to a broader interdisciplinary audience of government agencies, NGOs, and marine resource managers.