Rawson Thomas, Dawkins Marian Stamp, Bonsall Michael B
Mathematical Ecology Research Group, Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom.
Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, John Krebs Field Station, Oxford, United Kingdom.
Front Microbiol. 2019 Aug 21;10:1940. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2019.01940. eCollection 2019.
Globally, the bacterial genus is one of the leading causes of human gastroenteritis, with its primary route of infection being through poultry meat. The application of biosecurity measures is currently limited by a lack of understanding of the transmission dynamics within a flock. Our work is the first to undertake a mathematical modeling approach to population dynamics within a flock of broilers (chickens bred specifically for meat). A system of stochastic differential equations is used to model the routes of infection between co-housed birds. The presented model displays the strong correlation between housing density and prevalence, and shows how stochastic variation is the driving factor determining which strains of will emerge first within a flock. The model also shows how the system will rapidly select for phenotypic advantages, to quickly eliminate demographically-weaker strains. A global sensitivity analysis is performed, highlighting that the growth and death rate of other native bacterial species likely contributes the greatest to preventing flock outbreaks, presenting a promising approach to hypothesizing new methods of combatting disease transmission.
在全球范围内，该细菌属是人类肠胃炎的主要病因之一，其主要感染途径是通过禽肉。目前，生物安全措施的应用因对鸡群内传播动态缺乏了解而受到限制。我们的工作首次采用数学建模方法来研究肉鸡（专门为获取鸡肉而饲养的鸡）群内的种群动态。一个随机微分方程组被用于模拟同舍饲养禽类之间的感染途径。所提出的模型展示了饲养密度与该细菌属患病率之间的强相关性，并表明随机变异是决定鸡群中哪些菌株会首先出现的驱动因素。该模型还展示了系统将如何迅速选择表型优势，以快速消除种群数量上较弱的菌株。进行了一项全局敏感性分析，突出表明其他本地细菌物种的生长和死亡率可能对预防鸡群疫情爆发贡献最大，这为设想对抗疾病传播的新方法提供了一种有前景的途径。
