Pathogen Emergence As Complex Biological Invasion: Lessons From Dynamical Systems Modeling

Infectious disease emergence has become the target of cross-disciplinary efforts that aim to understand and predict the shape of outbreaks. The many challenges involved with the prediction of disease emergence events is a characteristic that infectious diseases share with biological invasions in many subfields of ecology (e.g., how certain plants are able to successfully invade a new niche). Like infectious diseases, biological invasions by plants and animals involve interactions between agents (pathogens and plants in their respective cases) and recipient niche. In this study, we examine the problem of pathogen emergence through the lens of a framework first developed for the study of plant invasions, restructured to apply to pathogen invaders. We utilize mathematical techniques to examine how complex dynamics emerge between the various actors in a multi-component pathogen invasion process, which implies invasion frameworks can offer new insight on the particulars of infectious disease emergence. Summarizing, we consider these results in context of their application to epidemiology, and more broadly with regards to modern efforts to bring the vernacular of complex systems to more real-world systems and problems. In doing so, we demonstrate the potential power in mathematizing conceptual models, and connecting ideas across disparate fields, toward a more rigorous picture of the nuances that underlie the dynamics of biological systems.