Within-host drivers of zoonotic disease dynamics

Individuals are host to a diverse set of organisms, including parasite communities of helminths, protozoa, bacteria, and viruses, but how each component interacts is unclear.

We propose that each within-host component fluctuates in response to within-host drivers, but also to changes in the environment.

The consequences of interaction are important, especially if we consider that zoonotic parasites and pathogens are part of that interacting system.

Changes in within-host homeostasis is particularly important (and unknown) when host numbers and interactions can change rapidly and dramatically (for example, during rewilding of the environment or drug treatment of a host).

Here, we will focus on understanding the intersection of environmental changes on within-host parasite interactions in agroecosystems including wildlife hosts and livestock as reservoirs of zoonoses; the latter because they are subject to parasite/pathogen treatments that naturally perturb the parasite community.

We will sample host microbiota, eurkaryome and virome to understand how parasite community fluctuations affects the prevalence of zoonotic pathogens (animal pathogens causing disease in humans) and the subsequent risk to public healt