PARENT SESSION
Poster Session # 2: Statistical Ecology and Ecological Modeling.

Monday, August 4 Presentation from 5:00 PM to 6:30 PM. SITCC Exhibit Hall B.

Modeling of arboviruses in Florida.

Lord, Cynthia ^*,1, Day, Jonathan¹, ¹ University of Florida - IFAS, Vero Beach, FL, USA

ABSTRACT- We are using simulation models to understand the ecology and transmission of arboviruses, such as St. Louis encephalitis and West Nile viruses. These viruses cycle between avian and mosquito species and human risk of disease is related to the levels of transmission in wild birds. Initial models suggested an interaction between the timing of peak mosquito populations and peak bird reproduction in the likelihood of outbreaks. A finer scaled sensitivity analysis was performed with most parameters fixed at most probable values and only those parameters controlling the timing of mosquito and avian populatons allowed to vary. There were more outbreaks in this set of simulations than in previous sensitivty analyses, showing that the most probable parameter values were very permissive for outbreaks. This analysis showed that interactions between parameters are important in the likelihood of outbreaks. We are pursuing this by considering fewer parameters in combinations to look for interactions which affect the likelihood of outbreaks. None of the timing parameters affected the likelihood of outbreaks directly, but mosquito mortality rates did influence the likelihood of outbreaks. Laboratory and field experiments have shown that mortality is age dependent, which may change the influnce of mosquito mortality on outbreaks. We are developing models incorporating age-dependent mortality to determine the effect on arbovirus transmission

Key words: arbovirus, simulation model, Culex nigripalpus