TY - JOUR T1 - Landscape Epidemiology and Control of Pathogens with Cryptic and Long-Distance Dispersal: Sudden Oak Death in Northern Californian Forests A1 - Filipe, João A. N. A1 - Cobb, Richard C. A1 - Meentemeyer, Ross K. A1 - Lee, Christopher A. A1 - Valachovic, Yana S. A1 - Cook, Alex R. A1 - Rizzo, David M. A1 - Gilligan, Christopher A. Y1 - 2012/01/05 N2 - Author Summary We discuss principles governing the spread and management of diseases in natural forest ecosystems. Invasive organisms are damaging world forests and agricultural crops at an increasing rate and severity due to global trade and environmental disturbances. While prevention is the best option, practitioners must decide whether and how to act once a pathogen emerges in a new environment. But, how do we know that an invasion is occurring, its current extent, and its future spread? Emerging pathogens are often observed too late because they are unknown or difficult to detect before causing damage. Once we detect the invader, what can we do to manage and hopefully eliminate it? As many invasions occur rapidly on large geographic scales, small-scale affordable experimentation is not an option, so we need predictive models to gain insight into these questions. Invaders are more challenging if they disperse cryptically and over long distances. We study the case of sudden oak death in California, estimating where and how fast it is spreading, and showing that resources for management must be deployed rationally and early in order to succeed. A promising strategy is curative treatment at the core with preventive protection stretching far around the focus of the outbreak. JF - PLOS Computational Biology JA - PLOS Computational Biology VL - 8 IS - 1 UR - https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1002328 SP - e1002328 EP - PB - Public Library of Science M3 - doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.1002328 ER -