Employing Emerging Methods Across Scales to Investigate Environmental Determinants of Zoonotic Spillover Restricted; Files & ToC

Abstract

Production and extraction of global commodities such as timber, minerals, and livestock influence infectious disease spillover risk at multiple geographic scales of interaction between people, animals, and the environment. Sustainable stewardship of these resources may therefore reduce infectious disease burden among myriad other known benefits. My dissertation research employs emerging methods and interdisciplinary principles of disease ecology to explore environmental factors driving zoonotic spillover across scales in central and southern Africa. My first two aims integrate population and community dynamics by examining within- and between-host metagenomic microbiome and resistome diversity among human and chicken populations in Maputo, Mozambique. My third aim explores industrial drivers of habitat degradation and risk of mpox spillover between wildlife and human populations in the Congo Basin through population-region scaling and analysis of spatially structured between-species host population dynamics. This multiscale disease ecology dissertation research provides evidence to guide local policy interventions regarding industrial activities and informs infectious disease surveillance efforts to identify and mitigate spillover risk among human, livestock, and wildlife populations.  

Specific Aim 1: Assess the microbiomes and resistomes of commercially raised or indigenous household chickens across the poultry value chain in Maputo City, Mozambique

Specific Aim 2: Characterize and compare E. coli strains detected in children and chickens in Maputo City, Mozambique

Specific Aim 3:  Define the ecological mechanisms underlying the relationship between extractive industrial activities and mpox spillover

Table of Contents

This table of contents is under embargo until 21 August 2031

About this Dissertation

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School	Laney Graduate School
Department	Environmental Health
Degree	Ph.D.
Submission	Dissertation
Language	English
Research Field	Biology, Ecology Environmental Health Health Sciences, Public Health
Keyword	zoonotic
Committee Chair / Thesis Advisor	Lance Waller, Emory University Maya Nadimpalli, Emory University
Committee Members	Matthew Freeman, Emory University Chimene Nze-Nkogue, Institut de Recherche en Ecologie Tropicale

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