Rise of Machines in Disease Ecology

In this issue of the Paper Trail, an arising and established researcher connect on the topic of host–pathogen associations in disease ecology and predicting their occurrence using machine learning. The former, a postdoctoral scholar at UC Davis, has set his sights on developing tools for surveillance of emerging viruses that pose pandemic threats, like Zika, West Nile, and Dengue. The latter, a scientist at the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies, has already blazed a trail through research and the publication of two seminal papers. In an interview with PT, Pranav and Barbara discuss their career trajectories that led them to macroecology and machine learning, and the importance of iterating between model predictions and empirical data collection.—Stephen L. Young,？Paper Trail editor Paper Trail: Pranav, how did you become interested in disease ecology? Pranav: I was always interested in wildlife and bird watching since my school days in India. During my second year of veterinary studies, India experienced its first outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza. This sparked discussions about the role of migratory birds in importing the disease from China and Mongolia. I was fortunate to participate in a large‐scale surveillance program for avian influenza in migratory waterfowl in the coming years. This piqued my interest in ecology and epidemiology of diseases in wildlife. Following my veterinary studies, I pursued a Master's of Preventive Veterinary Medicine at the UC Davis, where I received formal training in epidemiology and mathematical modeling of infectious diseases. Building upon this training, for my Ph.D. I moved to France and worked on a livestock system to develop a model that simulates spread of Q fever in a dairy metapopulation. Now, I'm back at UC Davis, as a postdoctoral fellow, working on emerging infectious diseases. PT: Great story and your travels must have given you invaluable experience. Barbara, tell the readers your story of how you ended up working in disease ecology. Barbara: I have always been interested in animals and animal health and got involved in behavioral ecology research as an undergraduate at Pepperdine University with Lee Kats. I was completely hooked by the creativity of asking and answering scientific questions. I started my Ph.D. at Oregon State University with Andrew Blaustein in 2002. Around this time, chytrid fungus in amphibians had just been discovered. It was causing high mortality in frogs in the Sierra Nevada of California, and in Panama. I built my thesis around trying to understand what chytrid fungus