EvoLunch Seminar: Gergely Ódor (Medical University of Vienna)
EvoLunch Seminar
From viral mutations to transmission networks: what wastewater reveals about spatial epidemic spread
"From viral mutations to transmission networks: what wastewater reveals about spatial epidemic spread"
11:00 CET
Mondi 2ab, Central Building, ISTA
Hybrid Meeting (for zoom link, email evolunch.seminar@ist.ac.at)
How can we reconstruct the spatial spread of a virus when transmission between populations cannot be observed directly? In this talk, I will present our recent work on using mutation-counting methods to infer transmission patterns from wastewater sequence data. We validate the methods in simulated epidemics and then apply them to SARS-CoV-2 data from Austria, Switzerland and Liechtenstein. Our results reveal seasonal changes in spatial transmission, systematic deviations from commuting patterns, and temporal changes coinciding with restrictions and tourism. Finally, we will discuss how wastewater sequence data could complement mobility data to reveal otherwise hidden patterns of epidemic spread in other settings.