The Challenges of Developing Spatially Explicit Network Models for the Management of Disease Vectors in Ecological Systems

Abstract

Challenges of modelling vector-borne disease systems result from complexities and uncertainities inherent in the vector’s behavioural ecology and its interactions in a landscape context. Network models provide a number of approaches and measures to quantify spatially-explicit systems that are consistent with the ecological process of vector dispersal, with implications for disease transmission and spread [1,2]. Here we discuss two spatially explicit vector systems as network models; (1) the movement of the invasive mosquito Aedes aegypti, which vectors a number of diseases including dengue fever, through rainwater tanks in a major urban area, (2) the movement of bats (flying-foxes), which vector Hendra virus, through urban and rural landscapes [3]. We contrast the design and applicability of these networks, comparing features and challenges inherent in modelling these systems, and discuss the use of network models as disease vector management tools with implications for disease spread.