Our group works on the transmission dynamics of animal infectious diseases (AID) especially in relation to climate change, to predict future trends and the impacts of interventions. This has been primarily focused on helminths of grazing ruminants but also includes other pathogens and hosts, applying a variety of model types across AID in livestock and wildlife.
We would be interested and able to develop and apply models as an adjunct to development of new interventions, e.g. to:
- Set thresholds for epidemiologically useful performance from tools under development;
- Determine how outcomes would be different under future climate and management change;
- Make the epidemiological case for specific interventions to assist priority setting for research, industry and policy.
Queen's University Belfast (QUB) is a leading research-intensive University and is currently ranked first in the UK for research in veterinary and agricultural sciences (REF 2021). The Institute for Global Food Security has excellent facilities and a strong track record across multiple fields, and holds an Athena Swan gold award for gender equality. Partnership with the Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute brings opportunities for access to experimental farms and diagnostic laboratories. Computer modelling is supported by the Kelvin 2 High Performance Computing facility, which is routinely used in our climate change simulations.
