Climate and Infection-age on West Nile Virus Transmission-- Prospectus

This dissertation will include two projects related to the impact of climate and demography on mosquito-borne disease transmission. The first project involves the development of a non-autonomous logistic model and optimization framework for connecting discrete time-series data to continuous epidemiological models and is part of the Climate Integrated Model for Mosquito-borne Infectious Diseases (CIMMID)
initiative at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. The second project uses a partial differential equations framework to model West Nile Virus (WNV) transmission between mosquito vectors, avian hosts, and humans. This model incorporates the effect of temperature and mosquito age on disease transmission. Temperature dependence is included due to its effect on mosquito mortality, pathogen development, and
transmission probability. Mosquito age also plays a role in transmission due to the mosquito’s short lifespan– increasing or decreasing the longevity of mosquitoes by just a few days may greatly impact the number of human cases. The existence and uniqueness of solutions was proven for a simplified version of the model, and the full model will fit human case data from Maricopa County, Arizona, and Toronto, Canada–
two locations with different climates, yet have both suffered WNV outbreaks in recent years. Understanding the region-specific drivers of WNV infection as well as the combined role of temperature and mosquito age on transmission will help us better prepare for new emerging diseases and vectors.