Pathogens manipulate the preference of vectors, slowing disease spread in a multi‐host system

The spread of vector‐borne pathogens depends on a complex set of interactions among pathogen, vector, and host. In single‐host systems, pathogens can induce changes in vector preferences for infected vs. healthy hosts. Yet it is unclear if pathogens also induce changes in vector preference among hos...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:	Ecology letters Vol. 22; no. 7; pp. 1115 - 1125
Main Authors:	Shoemaker, Lauren G., Hayhurst, Evelyn, Weiss‐Lehman, Christopher P., Strauss, Alexander T., Porath‐Krause, Anita, Borer, Elizabeth T., Seabloom, Eric W., Shaw, Allison K., Metcalf, Jessiaca
Format:	Journal Article
Language:	English
Published:	England Blackwell Publishing Ltd 01-07-2019
Subjects:	Barley/cereal yellow dwarf virus behavioural ecology Communities disease ecology Disease spread host diversity Host preferences Host systems pathogen transmission Pathogens Preferences vector behaviour vector manipulation hypothesis vectored disease modelling Vectors vector‐borne disease behavioural ecology host diversity vector behaviour vector manipulation hypothesis Barley/cereal yellow dwarf virus vectored disease modelling disease ecology pathogen transmission vector-borne disease
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Summary:	The spread of vector‐borne pathogens depends on a complex set of interactions among pathogen, vector, and host. In single‐host systems, pathogens can induce changes in vector preferences for infected vs. healthy hosts. Yet it is unclear if pathogens also induce changes in vector preference among host species, and how changes in vector behaviour alter the ecological dynamics of disease spread. Here, we couple multi‐host preference experiments with a novel model of vector preference general to both single and multi‐host communities. We show that viruliferous aphids exhibit strong preferences for healthy and long‐lived hosts. Coupling experimental results with modelling to account for preference leads to a strong decrease in overall pathogen spread through multi‐host communities due to non‐random sorting of viruliferous vectors between preferred and non‐preferred host species. Our results demonstrate the importance of the interplay between vector behaviour and host diversity as a key mechanism in the spread of vectored‐diseases.
Bibliography:	SourceType-Other Sources-1 content type line 63 ObjectType-Correspondence-1
ISSN:	1461-023X 1461-0248
DOI:	10.1111/ele.13268