title: A model of spatial epidemic spread when individuals move within overlapping home ranges.
abstract: One of the central goals of mathematical epidemiology is to predict disease transmission patterns in populations. Two models are commonly used to predict spatial spread of a disease. The first is the distributed-contacts model, often described by a contact distribution among stationary individuals. The second is the distributed-infectives model, often described by the diffusion of infected individuals. However, neither approach is ideal when individuals move within home ranges. This paper presents a unified modeling hypothesis, called the restricted-movement model. We use this model to predict spatial spread in settings where infected individuals move within overlapping home ranges. Using mathematical and computational approaches, we show that our restricted-movement model has three limits: the distributed-contacts model, the distributed-infectives model, and a third, less studied advective distributed-infectives limit. We also calculate approximate upper bounds for the rates of an epidemic's spatial spread. Guidelines are suggested for determining which limit is most appropriate for a specific disease.
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT 06520, USA. timothy.reluga@yale.edu
authors.forename: Timothy C
authors.initials: TC
authors.lastname: Reluga
authors.forename: Jan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Medlock
authors.forename: Alison P
authors.initials: AP
authors.lastname: Galvani
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D000818:Animals; D003141:Communicable Diseases / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000635:transmission*; D003198:Computer Simulation; D004196:Disease Outbreaks / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D004812:Epidemiologic Methods; D006801:Humans; D008124:Locomotion; D008954:Models, Biological