Integrative and Comparative Biology Integrative and Comparative Biology, volume 54, number 3, pp. 338–339 doi:10.1093/icb/icu101
Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology
INVITED CONCEPTUAL PAPER
A New Division of Ecoimmunology and Disease Ecology Lynn B. Martin,1,* Raoul K. Boughton† and Daniel R. Ardia‡ *Integrative Biology, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL 33620, USA; †Wildlife, Ecology and Conservation, Range Cattle Research Station, University of Florida, 3401 Experiment Station, Ona, FL 33865, USA; ‡Department of Biology, Franklin and Marshall College, PO Box 3003, Lancaster, PA 17604, USA E-mail: [email protected]
Synopsis The Division of Ecoimmunology and Disease Ecology (hereafter, DEDE) was founded in January 2014, and its bylaws approved in May of that year, to encourage the growth of research addressing the mechanistic aspects of host– parasite interactions. The purpose of DEDE is to facilitate communication, research, and data-sharing among scientists and promote mentoring and training of students and early career investigators, excellence of research, and the fundamentals of societal business. Here, we review briefly the history of the field, and the history of the discipline with SICB.
Introduction Ecological immunology, more commonly known as ecoimmunology, is a rather young field. Its roots can be traced to sexual selection theory as these ideas were among the first to attract the attention of many ecologists and evolutionary biologists to host–parasite interactions. The ImmunocompetenceHandicap hypothesis, which arose from those earlier ideas, was posited as a generic, yet physiological mechanism whereby sexually selected traits could be kept honest. Although this and related ideas continue to attract attention, ecoimmunology has broadened its evolutionary and ecological scope and begun to merge with a related discipline, disease ecology. Disease ecology is also a young field, although some of its progenitors (i.e., parasitology and epidemiology) have a long, rich history. Disease ecology differs in that it seeks to understand and predict disease-associated phenomena above the individual level, including the emergence, periodicity, and consequences of diseases on populations, communities, and ecosystems (e.g., community stability). Just last year, the Ecological Society of America welcomed a new Section of Disease Ecology, recognizing the importance of work in this field, especially in light of how anthropogenic activities are exacerbating the risk of disease for humans and wildlife and our emerging understanding of disease in shaping communities.
The complex interactions driving disease ecology are similar to those which fostered the growth and expansion of ecoimmunology: host–parasite interactions are so incredibly complex that traditional deep-but-narrow research could only lead so far. Deep-and-broad efforts, such as those favored by disease ecology and ecoimmunology, provide a perspective much like other modern, integrative and multidisciplinary efforts. Coupled with the advent of various molecular tools, new statistical techniques, and creative efforts in modeling, an integrative approach is probably what makes the two fields among the most rapidly growing in ecology and evolutionary biology. The only thing that distinguishes them is that disease ecology tends to focus on super-organismal phenomena and ecoimmunology on sub-organismal phenomena; many practitioners claim allegiance to both fields. In 2009, the National Science Foundation supported a Research Coordination Network in Ecological Immunology (RCNE). Authors Martin and Ardia as well as Dana Hawley (Virginia Tech) were fortunate to serve as Principal Investigators on the RCNE. This NSF-funded research network greatly aided the field by supporting: (1) development and maintenance of a webpage with links to job advertisements, new publications and grant opportunities, (2) trainee exchanges among participant laboratories, (3) a repository of technical protocols, and (4) a hub
Advanced Access publication July 22, 2014 ß The Author 2014. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology. All rights reserved. For permissions please email: [email protected].
Downloaded from http://icb.oxfordjournals.org/ at University of California, San Francisco on August 24, 2014
1
339
Ecoimmunology and disease ecology Table 1 Previous symposia (since 2004) of topics related to ecoimmunology and/or disease ecology Symposium
Conveners
2004
Ecophysiology and Conservation
Robert Stevenson and Shea Tuberty
2006
Ecological Immunology: Recent Advances and Application for Conservation and Public Health
Kelly Lee, Bram Lutton and Martin Wikelski
2007
The ecology and evolution of disease dynamics
Yang Kuang, James Elser, John Nagy, Timothy Newman and Val Smith
2009
Psychoneuroimmunology meets Integrative Biology
Lynn B. Martin
2011
Bridging the gap between ecoimmunology and disease ecology
Susannah French, Denise Dearing and Greg Demas
2014
Methods and mechanisms in ecological immunology
Cynthia Downs, Jim Adelman and Greg Demas
2014
Parasitic manipluation of host phenotype, or how to make a zombie
Kelly Weinersmith and Zen Faulkes
for interactions among 4120 members. Those interactions culminated in annual workshops in which RCNE members met to discuss and present research on topics including the costs of immunity, host– parasite co-evolution, and refining methods and theory. Two meetings were independent, Tampa, FL (2010) and Woods Hole, MA (2014), but the other three co-occurred with a related event; in Edinburgh, Scotland (2011), it was a ‘wild immunology’ conference hosted by the Center for Immunity, Infection, and Evolution; in Berlin, Germany (2013), it was a workshop of the DFG (German Research Foundation) Special Programme 1399 Host–Parasite Co-evolution working group; in Ann Arbor (2012), it was the annual Ecology and Evolution of Infectious Disease meeting. The success of these meetings and the short lifespan of the RCNE grant seeded the idea that there was a large ecoimmunology research community needing a home. SICB is a natural home for Division of Ecoimmunology and Disease Ecology (DEDE). The Society was home to a Division of Comparative Immunology, which was formally dissolved in the mid-1990s. In addition, SICB has hosted multiple symposia and numerous other events fostering the growth of ecoimmunology; indeed, almost every year since 2004, at least one event has occurred (Table 1). The Divisions of
Animal Behavior (DAB), Comparative Endocrinology (DCE), Comparative Biochemistry and Physiology (DCPB), and others are to thank for fostering and/or sponsoring these events. Last and most importantly, SICB is a great home for DEDE because it has always been an incubator for new ideas. As both ecoimmunology and disease ecology embrace complexity, studying wild organisms in their natural, evolved contexts (no matter the practical challenges), they fit well within the scope of SICB’s mission. This directive has not been without impediments in DEDE research; capturing the subtleties of host–parasite dynamics with the tools developed for domesticated rodents living in animal facilities is quite difficult! Fortunately, many immunologists, epidemiologists, biomedical researchers, and neuroscientists are becoming intrigued by the efforts of their eco-evolutionary brethren. We feel that various realms of physiology, including ecoimmunology and disease ecology, are at the cusp of making some exciting and critical contributions to biology!
Funding Funding for the Research Coordination Network in Ecological Immunology comes from IOS-0947177.
Downloaded from http://icb.oxfordjournals.org/ at University of California, San Francisco on August 24, 2014
Year
Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology
INVITED CONCEPTUAL PAPER
A New Division of Ecoimmunology and Disease Ecology Lynn B. Martin,1,* Raoul K. Boughton† and Daniel R. Ardia‡ *Integrative Biology, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL 33620, USA; †Wildlife, Ecology and Conservation, Range Cattle Research Station, University of Florida, 3401 Experiment Station, Ona, FL 33865, USA; ‡Department of Biology, Franklin and Marshall College, PO Box 3003, Lancaster, PA 17604, USA E-mail: [email protected]
Synopsis The Division of Ecoimmunology and Disease Ecology (hereafter, DEDE) was founded in January 2014, and its bylaws approved in May of that year, to encourage the growth of research addressing the mechanistic aspects of host– parasite interactions. The purpose of DEDE is to facilitate communication, research, and data-sharing among scientists and promote mentoring and training of students and early career investigators, excellence of research, and the fundamentals of societal business. Here, we review briefly the history of the field, and the history of the discipline with SICB.
Introduction Ecological immunology, more commonly known as ecoimmunology, is a rather young field. Its roots can be traced to sexual selection theory as these ideas were among the first to attract the attention of many ecologists and evolutionary biologists to host–parasite interactions. The ImmunocompetenceHandicap hypothesis, which arose from those earlier ideas, was posited as a generic, yet physiological mechanism whereby sexually selected traits could be kept honest. Although this and related ideas continue to attract attention, ecoimmunology has broadened its evolutionary and ecological scope and begun to merge with a related discipline, disease ecology. Disease ecology is also a young field, although some of its progenitors (i.e., parasitology and epidemiology) have a long, rich history. Disease ecology differs in that it seeks to understand and predict disease-associated phenomena above the individual level, including the emergence, periodicity, and consequences of diseases on populations, communities, and ecosystems (e.g., community stability). Just last year, the Ecological Society of America welcomed a new Section of Disease Ecology, recognizing the importance of work in this field, especially in light of how anthropogenic activities are exacerbating the risk of disease for humans and wildlife and our emerging understanding of disease in shaping communities.
The complex interactions driving disease ecology are similar to those which fostered the growth and expansion of ecoimmunology: host–parasite interactions are so incredibly complex that traditional deep-but-narrow research could only lead so far. Deep-and-broad efforts, such as those favored by disease ecology and ecoimmunology, provide a perspective much like other modern, integrative and multidisciplinary efforts. Coupled with the advent of various molecular tools, new statistical techniques, and creative efforts in modeling, an integrative approach is probably what makes the two fields among the most rapidly growing in ecology and evolutionary biology. The only thing that distinguishes them is that disease ecology tends to focus on super-organismal phenomena and ecoimmunology on sub-organismal phenomena; many practitioners claim allegiance to both fields. In 2009, the National Science Foundation supported a Research Coordination Network in Ecological Immunology (RCNE). Authors Martin and Ardia as well as Dana Hawley (Virginia Tech) were fortunate to serve as Principal Investigators on the RCNE. This NSF-funded research network greatly aided the field by supporting: (1) development and maintenance of a webpage with links to job advertisements, new publications and grant opportunities, (2) trainee exchanges among participant laboratories, (3) a repository of technical protocols, and (4) a hub
Advanced Access publication July 22, 2014 ß The Author 2014. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology. All rights reserved. For permissions please email: [email protected].
Downloaded from http://icb.oxfordjournals.org/ at University of California, San Francisco on August 24, 2014
1
339
Ecoimmunology and disease ecology Table 1 Previous symposia (since 2004) of topics related to ecoimmunology and/or disease ecology Symposium
Conveners
2004
Ecophysiology and Conservation
Robert Stevenson and Shea Tuberty
2006
Ecological Immunology: Recent Advances and Application for Conservation and Public Health
Kelly Lee, Bram Lutton and Martin Wikelski
2007
The ecology and evolution of disease dynamics
Yang Kuang, James Elser, John Nagy, Timothy Newman and Val Smith
2009
Psychoneuroimmunology meets Integrative Biology
Lynn B. Martin
2011
Bridging the gap between ecoimmunology and disease ecology
Susannah French, Denise Dearing and Greg Demas
2014
Methods and mechanisms in ecological immunology
Cynthia Downs, Jim Adelman and Greg Demas
2014
Parasitic manipluation of host phenotype, or how to make a zombie
Kelly Weinersmith and Zen Faulkes
for interactions among 4120 members. Those interactions culminated in annual workshops in which RCNE members met to discuss and present research on topics including the costs of immunity, host– parasite co-evolution, and refining methods and theory. Two meetings were independent, Tampa, FL (2010) and Woods Hole, MA (2014), but the other three co-occurred with a related event; in Edinburgh, Scotland (2011), it was a ‘wild immunology’ conference hosted by the Center for Immunity, Infection, and Evolution; in Berlin, Germany (2013), it was a workshop of the DFG (German Research Foundation) Special Programme 1399 Host–Parasite Co-evolution working group; in Ann Arbor (2012), it was the annual Ecology and Evolution of Infectious Disease meeting. The success of these meetings and the short lifespan of the RCNE grant seeded the idea that there was a large ecoimmunology research community needing a home. SICB is a natural home for Division of Ecoimmunology and Disease Ecology (DEDE). The Society was home to a Division of Comparative Immunology, which was formally dissolved in the mid-1990s. In addition, SICB has hosted multiple symposia and numerous other events fostering the growth of ecoimmunology; indeed, almost every year since 2004, at least one event has occurred (Table 1). The Divisions of
Animal Behavior (DAB), Comparative Endocrinology (DCE), Comparative Biochemistry and Physiology (DCPB), and others are to thank for fostering and/or sponsoring these events. Last and most importantly, SICB is a great home for DEDE because it has always been an incubator for new ideas. As both ecoimmunology and disease ecology embrace complexity, studying wild organisms in their natural, evolved contexts (no matter the practical challenges), they fit well within the scope of SICB’s mission. This directive has not been without impediments in DEDE research; capturing the subtleties of host–parasite dynamics with the tools developed for domesticated rodents living in animal facilities is quite difficult! Fortunately, many immunologists, epidemiologists, biomedical researchers, and neuroscientists are becoming intrigued by the efforts of their eco-evolutionary brethren. We feel that various realms of physiology, including ecoimmunology and disease ecology, are at the cusp of making some exciting and critical contributions to biology!
Funding Funding for the Research Coordination Network in Ecological Immunology comes from IOS-0947177.
Downloaded from http://icb.oxfordjournals.org/ at University of California, San Francisco on August 24, 2014
Year
