John M. Drake

Leverhulme Visiting Professor 2012

Anticipating critical transitions in dynamical systems is a difficult problem that has seen a number of developments in recent years. In this study, John sought to determine if these developments could be applied to anticipate the emergence of new infectious diseases. The project first used simulation data to demonstrate that statistical signatures of disease emergence may be hidden in routine surveillance data. He then used these methods to search for such signatures in data on historical emergence events.