TY - JOUR
T1 - The effect of landscape, transmission mode and social behavior on disease transmission
T2 - Simulating the transmission of chronic wasting disease in white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) populations using a spatially explicit agent-based model
AU - Kjær, Lene J.
AU - Schauber, Eric M.
N1 - Funding Information:
Primary funding for this research was provided by the Illinois Department of Natural Resources through the Federal Aid in Wildlife Restoration Project W-87-R, with additional support from the SIUC Graduate School and the Cooperative Wildlife Research Laboratory .
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022
PY - 2022/10
Y1 - 2022/10
N2 - We developed a spatially explicit agent-based model (ABM), DeerLandscapeDisease (DLD), to investigate the effects of landscape structure, disease transmission, and management alternatives on dynamics of chronic wasting disease (CWD) in white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus). We fitted biased random walk models to data from GPS-collared deer to simulate movements of individual deer and deer groups in an agricultural landscape with fragmented forest patches and a forest-dominated landscape. We estimated behavioral and demographic parameters from field data and published literature of deer ecology. We considered both direct and indirect transmission routes and assumed that bioavailability of infectious pathogens deposited in the environment decreased exponentially over time. We tuned transmission parameters to match observed trajectories of CWD prevalence in Wisconsin, and assumed that infection probability during an encounter was equal for all age classes. Thus, infection prevalence varied with sex- and age-specific behavior. DLD simulations demonstrated significant effects of landscape structure, social behavior and transmission mode on temporal changes in prevalence. Prevalence rose faster and reached higher levels in fragmented forest landscapes due to aggregation of deer within small forest patches. Furthermore, simulation results suggested that CWD might be driven through a mix of frequency- and density-dependent processes, potentially facilitating coexistence of CWD and deer populations. These results demonstrate the utility of ABMs and the importance of including spatial and behavioral heterogeneity when modeling disease transmission.
AB - We developed a spatially explicit agent-based model (ABM), DeerLandscapeDisease (DLD), to investigate the effects of landscape structure, disease transmission, and management alternatives on dynamics of chronic wasting disease (CWD) in white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus). We fitted biased random walk models to data from GPS-collared deer to simulate movements of individual deer and deer groups in an agricultural landscape with fragmented forest patches and a forest-dominated landscape. We estimated behavioral and demographic parameters from field data and published literature of deer ecology. We considered both direct and indirect transmission routes and assumed that bioavailability of infectious pathogens deposited in the environment decreased exponentially over time. We tuned transmission parameters to match observed trajectories of CWD prevalence in Wisconsin, and assumed that infection probability during an encounter was equal for all age classes. Thus, infection prevalence varied with sex- and age-specific behavior. DLD simulations demonstrated significant effects of landscape structure, social behavior and transmission mode on temporal changes in prevalence. Prevalence rose faster and reached higher levels in fragmented forest landscapes due to aggregation of deer within small forest patches. Furthermore, simulation results suggested that CWD might be driven through a mix of frequency- and density-dependent processes, potentially facilitating coexistence of CWD and deer populations. These results demonstrate the utility of ABMs and the importance of including spatial and behavioral heterogeneity when modeling disease transmission.
KW - Agent-based modeling
KW - Chronic wasting disease
KW - Deer behavior
KW - Empirical-based movement
KW - Spatially explicit
KW - White-tailed deer
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U2 - 10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2022.110114
DO - 10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2022.110114
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85137115080
SN - 0304-3800
VL - 472
JO - Ecological Modelling
JF - Ecological Modelling
M1 - 110114
ER -