US-Israel Collab: Pathogens and disease transmission in migratory birds along the Palearctic-African flyway

这项研究的主要目的是了解候鸟在世界各地传播各种致病因子方面所起的作用。 野生动物被认为是能够传播不同类型的病毒和细菌病原体的载体，或者是能够储存不同类型的病毒和细菌病原体的环境储存库。在这个项目中，研究人员将捕获，标记，收集血液和寄生虫样本，这些样本来自10种不同的鸟类，这些鸟类在以色列停留，在迁徙期间进食和休息。这些鸟在欧洲和亚洲的繁殖地和非洲的越冬地之间迁徙。将对每只鸟进行禽流感病毒和纽卡斯尔病病毒暴露试验，并对沙门氏菌、虱子和蜱的存在进行检测，并评估其一般健康状况。许多动物将安装GPS标签，记录个人的移动和位置，因为他们迁移，繁殖，越冬在几个月到几年的时间。此外，这项研究将为描述和预测候鸟传播疾病提供新的方法和工具。这些工具将有助于人类和牲畜的健康，也有助于野生动物的保护和管理。他们将提供给生态疾病研究界和教育目的在高中和colleages.The研究的科学目的是推进迁移如何影响宿主和病原体的进化生态学迁移宿主种群的知识，也要了解这在一个社区内的多个物种居住在一个地区暂时使用的迁移人口。这将通过比较以色列境内居民和移徙亚群的血清学、免疫学和生理学状况与在繁殖地和越冬地随机抽样的个人的情况来实现，这些地点是通过全球定位系统和数据记录标签获得的移动信息来揭示的。将对这些个人健康数据、高分辨率移动数据以及病原体基因组数据进行分析，以评估以色列境内和境外疾病的时间、强度和传播之间的关系。将使用Nova建模平台构建基于代理的计算模型，并用于评估相关变量之间的关系。 此外，这些模型将用于预测疾病系统对土地使用做法和全球气候变化的反应。

The primary aim of the study is to understand the role that migratory birds play in spreading various disease causing agents around the world. Wildlife has been implicated as a vector, capable of transmitting, or as an environmental reservoir, capable of storing, different types of viral and bacterial pathogens. In this project, the researchers will capture, tag, collect blood and parasite samples from birds belonging to ten different species that stop over in Israel to feed and rest during migration. These birds migrate between breeding sites in Europe and Asia and overwintering sites in Africa. Individual birds will be tested for exposure to avian influenza virus and Newcastle Disease virus, the presence of salmonella bacteria, lice and ticks, and their general state-of-health will be assessed. Many of the animals will be fitted with GPS tags that record the movement and locations of individuals as they migrate, breed, and overwinter over a period of many months to several years. In addition, this study will provide new methods and tools for describing and predicting disease transmission by migrating birds. These tools will be useful both for human and livestock health, as well as for the conservation and management of wildlife. They will be made available to the ecological disease research community and for educational purposes at high school and colleges.The scientific aim of the study is to advance knowledge of how migration impacts the evolutionary ecology of hosts and pathogens within migratory host populations and also to understand this within a community of multiple species residing in an area ephemerally used by migratory populations. This will be achieved by comparing the serological, immunological and physiological state of resident and migratory subpopulations within Israel with individuals opportunistically sampled in breeding and overwinter grounds, at sites revealed by movement information obtained from GPS and data-logging tags. These individual-health data, high resolution movement data as well as pathogen genomic data, will be analyzed to assess relationships in timing, intensity and spread of diseases within and beyond Israel. Agent-based computational models will be constructed using the Nova modeling platform and used to assess relationships among correlated variables. In addition, these models will be use to predict responses of disease systems to both land-use practices and global climate change.