Collaborative Research: Community composition and disease outcomes in a multihost-parasite system

随着传染病在野生动物和人类中的发病率持续上升，研究疾病的生态学变得越来越重要。然而，我们对自然系统中病原体和寄生虫的理解往往来自于从疾病动态实际发挥作用的复杂生态群落中提取的研究。最近的证据表明，生物群落中不同物种的存在/不存在和相对丰度可以极大地影响宿主-寄生虫相互作用的结果。然而，改变社区的组成可能会导致疾病风险的增加或减少，并且已经在很少的系统中对这些结果的机制进行了实验研究。本研究将通过实验研究由蜗牛，两栖动物和吸虫寄生虫组成的复杂宿主-寄生虫系统中群落组成在调节疾病结果中的作用。一系列实验将解决寄生虫宿主的感染如何受到多种宿主的组成和相对丰度变化的影响，多个寄生虫感染阶段和非宿主竞争者。该提案将在弗吉尼亚理工大学和拉德福大学的PI实验室之间建立一个合作研究计划（一个占主导地位的本科院校，距离弗吉尼亚理工大学25公里），将提供更广泛的教育经验，为学生在这两个机构。弗吉尼亚理工大学和拉德福大学之间的合作伙伴关系包括合作研究项目，联合实验室会议，以及对弗吉尼亚理工大学研究生和两所大学本科生研究的支持。此外，将根据研究结果为拉德福大学的生态学和寄生虫学课程编制一个关于宿主-寄生虫相互作用的教学单元，并将向更广泛的教学界传播。

As the incidence of infectious diseases in both wildlife and human populations continues to rise, studies addressing the ecology of disease are becoming more important. Too often, though, our understanding of pathogens and parasites in natural systems develops from studies abstracted from the complex ecological communities in which disease dynamics actually play out. Recent evidence suggests that the presence/absence and relative abundance of different species in the biological community can substantially influence the outcome of host-parasite interactions. However, changing the composition of the community can result in either an increase or decrease in disease risk, and the mechanisms responsible for these outcomes have been experimentally investigated in very few systems. This research will experimentally investigate the role of community composition in modulating disease outcomes in a complex host-parasite system composed of snails, amphibians, and a trematode parasite. A series of experiments will address how infection of parasite hosts is influenced by changes in the composition and relative abundance of multiple hosts, multiple parasite infectious stages and non-host competitors.This proposal will establish a collaborative research program between the laboratories of the PIs at Virginia Tech and Radford University (a predominately undergraduate institution 25 km from Virginia Tech) that will provide broader educational experiences for the students at both institutions. The partnership between Virginia Tech and Radford University includes collaborative research projects, joint laboratory meetings, and support of graduate students at Virginia Tech and undergraduate student research at both universities. In addition, a teaching module on host-parasite interactions based on the research results will be developed for Ecology and Parasitology courses at Radford University and will be disseminated to the broader teaching community.