Landscape Ecology and Mapping of Ehrlichial Pathogens

景观生态学和埃利希体病原体绘图

• 批准号: 6851958
• 负责人: MICHAEL C WIMBERLY
• 金额: $ 1.24万
• 依托单位: UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2005
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2005-03-01 至 2005-09-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/6851958
• 关键词: Rickettsiales; arthropod borne communicable disease; disease /disorder proneness /risk; disease vectors; ecology; ehrlichiosis; geographic difference; microorganism population study; model; model design /development; ticks

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The geographic ranges of many tick species have expanded over the past several decades, and several new tickborne zoonoses have emerged. 2 of these diseases are human monocytotropic ehrlichiosis (HME), caused by Ehrlichia chaffeensis; and human granulocytic anaplasmosis (HGA) caused by Anaplasma phagocytophilum. Maps of these and other emerging pathogens can play an important role in the assessment of regional public health. However, reliable data on the presence of vectors or pathogens is typically only available at isolated sample locations. The proposed research expands on a previous NIH-funded study in which information on serology of deer, climate, land cover, soils, and deer density were integrated into a regional geospatial database and used to map the distributions of E. chaffeensis and A. phagocytophilum. Our main objective is to apply concepts and methods from landscape ecology to improve our understanding of the environmental constraints on vector and pathogen spread, and to develop more effective methods for mapping pathogen distributions and disease risk. To accomplish this objective, we will (1) contrast the influences of various ecological variables on pathogen distributions across multiple spatial scales; (2) incorporate spatial indices of land cover heterogeneity as predictors of pathogen distributions; and (3) integrate ecological models with geostatistical methods to improve prediction accuracy and characterize spatial uncertainty. We expect that this work will result in an enhanced conceptual model of how the ranges of E. chaffeensis and A. phagocytophilum are constrained by multiple ecological factors operating at different spatial scales, along with more accurate maps of the geographic ranges of these pathogens. These maps will ultimately provide a framework for assessing infection risks in human populations. In addition, the methodologies that we develop will be useful for developing predictive maps of other vectors, pathogens, and diseases.

描述（由申请人提供）：过去几十年来，许多蜱种的地理分布范围有所扩大，并且出现了几种新的蜱传人畜共患病。其中 2 种疾病是人类单核埃利希体病 (HME)，由恰菲埃利希体引起；以及由嗜吞噬细胞无形体引起的人粒细胞无形体病（HGA）。这些和其他新出现的病原体的地图可以在区域公共卫生评估中发挥重要作用。然而，有关载体或病原体存在的可靠数据通常只能在孤立的样本位置获得。拟议的研究扩展了之前由 NIH 资助的一项研究，其中有关鹿的血清学、气候、土地覆盖、土壤和鹿密度的信息被整合到区域地理空间数据库中，并用于绘制查菲埃里希氏菌和嗜吞噬细胞鹿的分布图。 。我们的主要目标是应用景观生态学的概念和方法来提高我们对媒介和病原体传播的环境限制的理解，并开发更有效的方法来绘制病原体分布和疾病风险。为了实现这一目标，我们将（1）对比各种生态变量对多个空间尺度上病原体分布的影响； (2) 将土地覆盖异质性的空间指数纳入病原体分布的预测因子； （3）将生态模型与地统计学方法相结合，以提高预测精度并表征空间不确定性。我们预计这项工作将产生一个增强的概念模型，说明查菲埃里希菌和嗜吞噬细胞菌的范围如何受到在不同空间尺度上运作的多种生态因素的限制，以及这些病原体的地理范围的更准确的地图。这些地图最终将为评估人群感染风险提供一个框架。此外，我们开发的方法将有助于开发其他载体、病原体和疾病的预测图。