Publication
Title
Plague and climate : scales matter
Author
Abstract
Plague is enzootic in wildlife populations of small mammals in central and eastern Asia, Africa, South and North America, and has been recognized recently as a reemerging threat to humans. Its causative agent Yersinia pestis relies on wild rodent hosts and flea vectors for its maintenance in nature. Climate influences all three components (i.e., bacteria, vectors, and hosts) of the plague system and is a likely factor to explain some of plague's variability from small and regional to large scales. Here, we review effects of climate variables on plague hosts and vectors from individual or population scales to studies on the whole plague system at a large scale. Upscaled versions of small-scale processes are often invoked to explain plague variability in time and space at larger scales, presumably because similar scale-independent mechanisms underlie these relationships. This linearity assumption is discussed in the light of recent research that suggests some of its limitations.
Language
English
Source (journal)
PLoS pathogens. - San Francisco, Calif.
Publication
San Francisco, Calif. : 2011
ISSN
1553-7366
1553-7374
DOI
10.1371/JOURNAL.PPAT.1002160
Volume/pages
7 :9 (2011) , p. 1-6
Article Reference
e1002160
ISI
000295409000003
Medium
E-only publicatie
Full text (Publisher's DOI)
Full text (open access)
UAntwerpen
Faculty/Department
Research group
Project info
Infectious disease models: wildlife ecology, ecological disturbance and transmission to humans.
Publication type
Subject
Affiliation
Publications with a UAntwerp address
External links
Web of Science
Record
Identifier
Creation 21.09.2011
Last edited 04.03.2024
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