Avian disease ecology | #BOU2027

UNIVERSITY OF NOTTINGHAM, UK & ZOOM & BLUESKY

Avian disease ecology: combining avian ecology and OneHealth to understand and mitigate disease

Alfred Newton Lecture

The Alfred Newton Lecture is the BOU’s prestige lecture delivered by an internationally renowned figure on the theme of the annual conference.

Dana M. Hawley
Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Tech, USA

­Dana M. Hawley is a Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at Virginia Tech, USA, where she has been on the faculty for 19 years. Her research program focuses on the ecology and evolution of infectious diseases in songbirds, and she is an internationally-recognized expert in studies at the intersection of animal behaviour and infectious disease. Dr. Hawley’s work spans diverse questions including how individual behaviour influences the risk of acquiring or spreading parasites, why some pathogens evolve to cause more harm to their hosts, and the role of supplemental feeding in pathogen transmission. Dr. Hawley was a co-editor of the 2021 book Infectious Disease Ecology of Wild Birds, published by Oxford University Press. Dr. Hawley is also a strong advocate for science communication to the broader public, and has published several articles in popular science outlets such as Scientific American and the Conversation.

Keynote nominations

The public call for keynote nominations is now closed. Keynote speakers, once confirmed, will be announced here.

Aims and scope

The ongoing avian influenza pandemic has devastated wild bird populations across the globe and exemplifies the urgency of advancing our understanding of disease ecology in wild birds. In addition to highly infectious viral pathogens like avian influenza, birds face constant exposure to a diverse suite of parasites and pathogens which are increasingly recognised as having considerable impacts on bird behaviour, demography and extinction risk.

Recent advances have highlighted the importance of host immunity, co-infection dynamics, and within-host pathogen evolution in predicting infection outcomes within individuals. Environmental conditions and bird behaviour are also crucial mediators of onward transmission and epidemiology across populations and species. Fully decoding disease dynamics across scales – and limiting their impacts on populations – therefore requires a holistic and interdisciplinary approach that brings together scientists, conservation practitioners, and wildlife vets.

This conference will showcase the state of knowledge across diverse avian host-pathogen systems, and aims to bring together researchers and practitioners across fields to promote the interdisciplinary collaborations required to further advance our understanding of disease ecology in birds, and provide the knowledge and tools to mitigate the impacts of disease. Research on non-infectious disease in wild birds, such as disease related to plastic and chemical pollution, are also in scope.

We encourage submissions on the following topics:

• • Pathogen and parasite dynamics and their drivers
  • Adaptive and innate immune responses to pathogens and parasites
  • Pathogen and parasite ecology and evolution
  • Avian evolution in response to pathogens and parasites
  • Impact of pathogens and coinfection on host fitness and demography
  • Sub-lethal effects and contribution of avirulent strains to epidemiology
  • Mitigation of avian disease in conservation management
  • Birds as reservoirs and vectors for zoonotic pathogens and AMR
  • How bird movements and behaviour shape transmission and epidemiology
  • Methods for identifying and quantifying parasite and pathogen infection
  • Drivers of susceptibility and resistance
  • Vector-borne diseases/parasites
  • OneHealth approaches to disease prevention
  • How bird disease affects people and vice versa
  • Impact and prevalence of non-infectious disease, such as disease caused by pollution
  • Interactions between pollution and pathogen infection

Parallel conference format

The BOU aims to run inclusive and accessible events. One way we seek to achieve this is by delivering our conferences in parallel on a freely accessible social media platform. From 2025 onwards, this has been Bluesky.

All presenters at our conferences will be invited to post a summary of their presentation on Bluesky, and will be provided with helpful guidelines to support them in doing so. No conference registration, or Bluesky account, is required to view these presentations.

Social media has broadened the reach of our conferences, attracting a significantly larger and more diverse audience than meetings without this element.

View previous BOU conferences on Bluesky

Scientific Programme Committee

Alice Risely | Chair | University of Salford, UK & BOU Meetings Committee
Daniela de Angeli Dutra | Bangor University, UK
Jenny Dunn | Keele University, UK
Jamie Dunning | University of Leeds, UK & BOU Engagement Committee
Stephen Vickers | University of Aberdeen, UK

Image credits
Bass Rock | Randusr836 CC BY-SA 4.0 Wikimedia Commons
Northern Gannets | caroline legg CC BY 2.0 Wikimedia Commons
Chaffinch | Marius Vassnes CC BY-SA 4.0 Wikimedia Commons

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