Epidemiology and evolutionary ecology for invasion and persistence of disease

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One of the principal outputs from crop genomics and genetics research is likely to be a set of varieties and cultivars, incorporating novel resistance genes including polygenically-controlled resistance that impose new selection pressures on plant pathogens. While much is known about the physiology and molecular biology of host-pathogen interactions, relatively little is understood about how to translate these phenotypic responses into epidemiological traits from which to predict the likelihood of invasion and persistence of pathotypes under selective pressure. This project is designed to link UK and French expertise in modelling and experimental quantification of crop pathogens in order to develop and test a protocol for invasion and persistence that links population genetics for pathogen evolution with epidemiological dynamics. We will do this using a combination of mathematical modelling, statistical analysis and experimentation.

Aim: To devise and test modelling and experimental protocols to analyse and predict the effects of genetical control on the evolution, invasion and persistence of aerial and soil-borne plant pathogens and the consequences of this for the design and deployment of resistant varieties.

Objectives
1.To develop a suite of generic models that link population genetics with epidemiological dynamics in order to analyse evolution, invasion and persistence of (i) aerial and (ii) soil-borne plant pathogens.
2.To use the models to derive critical parameters that condition the likelihood of invasion and persistence of evolving isolates that differ in virulence, pathogenicity or aggressiveness.
3.To develop experimental and statistical protocols to quantify and estimate these critical parameters under controlled-environment and field conditions.
4.To use the models, in combination with experimentation to analyse the effects of trade-off in pathogen life-history parameters associated with pathogenicity, reproduction and dispersal.

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