Modelling vaccination effectiveness in the Amur tiger
This project was part of my MSc degree at the University of Glasgow. I adapted a SIR model to assess different vaccination strategies for a well-studied Amur tiger population in Russia. Model and project details can be accessed below in the research paper published in PNAS journal by the lead investigator and very talented researcher Martin Gilbert.
5/8/20241 min read
The model summary and main findings.
Details on the model and project here.
This mathematical model was originally written in Ruby programming language and run within an R script wrapper.
The model simulates different vaccination scenarios in this tiger population using population and diseases transmission parameters estimated by studying this population long-term.
At the end, scenarios were compared and the ones that reduce this population 50-year extinction probability were deemed the best.
This modelling work demonstrated even low-coverage vaccination could be feasible and make a positive impact in this endangered tiger population.
I always wanted to develop a similar work in endangered jaguar (Panthera onca) populations, especially in the Yucatan peninsula which has a long history in jaguar conservation, but recently been threaten by the highly controversial Mayan train megaproject.
