Dr Roman Biek - Research Interests

Lecturer

Room 401, Graham Kerr Building
Institute of Biodiversity, Animal Health & Comparative Medicine
College of Medical, Veterinary & Life Sciences
University of Glasgow
Glasgow
G12 8QQ

Tel.: 0141 330 4954
Fax: 0141 330 5971
E-mail: Roman.Biek@glasgow.ac.uk

Institute webpages - including grants, publications and research students 

I have broad interests in population ecology and genetics but my research focuses on the ecology and evolution of infectious diseases in wild animal populations.

What are the mechanisms that allow infectious organisms to spread across landscapes, to persist locally, or to infect new hosts? What are the temporal and spatial scales at which these processes take place? How does host ecology and behaviour, including movement and social interaction, affect parasite prevalence and evolution?

We try to address these types of questions using viruses as our primary model system. Viruses not only include many significant human and wildlife pathogens but are also known to undergo rapid genetic change, allowing us to study ecological and evolutionary dynamics on similar time scales. Genetic analyses play the most prominent role in our work but are often complemented by the use of field data and quantitative models.

Parasite persistence in fragmented host populations

As a host population gets smaller or decreases in density, the number of opportunities for parasite transmission become increasingly more rare to the point where the parasite may become locally extinct. This idea of a 'host population threshold' has generated much interest, in part because of implications for disease eradication, but so far there have been few empirical studies. We are using a group of natural islands within Loch Lomond, one of Scotlands largest lakes, to test whether population thresholds may limit the abundance of different types of parasites in two rodent species, woodmouse and bank vole. We are also interested how host population connectivity in this system, quantified using genetic markers, may affect parasite distribution in space and time.


Collaborators:
Victoria Paterson (PhD student)

Spatial epidemiology and evolution of wildlife rabies

Two large rabies outbreaks, one in red foxes the other in raccoons, have occurred in North America in recent decades. We are interested in the combined ecological and evolutionary processes taking place during different phases of these outbreaks (i.e. initial invasion, endemic state etc). Using the rabies system, we are also studying how physical properties of the landscape and spatial structure of host populations can affect the epidemiology and evolutionary dynamics of the pathogen.

Collaborators:
Leslie Real, Emory University, USA
Lance Waller, Emory University, USA
Charles Rupprecht, CDC, USA
Susan Nadin-Davis, Canadian Food Inspection Agency, Canada

Ebola virus emergence in Central Africa

Different strains of Ebola virus emerge at irregular intervals among human populations in central Africa. Outbreaks generally originate from exposure to infected wildlife and recent evidence shows that local populations of gorillas and chimpanzees are also severely affected. We are using the combined spatial, temporal and genetic data available to try to discriminate among different hypotheses regarding the epidemiology and ecology of Ebola. Key questions are thereby the identification of the natural reservoir species (suspected to be bats), the dynamics of spread, and the role of evolutionary processes (selection, recombination) in viral persistence and emergence.

Collaborators:
Leslie Real, Emory University, USA
Peter Walsh, Max-Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Germany
Eric Leroy, Centre International de Recherches Médicales de Franceville, Gabon

Parasites as host population markers

Viruses are unique in that they evolve more rapidly than any other organism. As part of my PhD research with Dr. Mary Poss, I tested whether rapid evolution in a host-specific virus (feline immunodeficiency virus or FIV) can be used to make inference about current population structure and recent demographic history of its feline host (cougar - Puma concolor). For this, I examined the genetic population structure of FIV as well as cougars (using microsatellites) in western Montana and adjacent areas. Not only was population substructure much more pronounced in the virus, but the FIV phylogeny also indicated a recent demographic expansion in the virus, which correlates well with a documented increase in the cougar host population. I am interested in applying a similar approach to other host-parasite systems and to evaluate its broader usefulness for addressing questions in biogeography, host life history, and conservation.

Collaborators:
Mary Poss, Pennsylvania State University, USA
Alexei Drummond, University of Auckland, New Zealand