Forecasting Pathogen Dynamics with Bayesian Model-Averaging: Application to Xylella fastidiosa
Abstract
Forecasting invasive-pathogen dynamics is paramount to anticipate eradication and
containment strategies. Such predictions can be obtained using a model grounded on
partial differential equations (PDE; often exploited to model invasions) and fitted to
surveillance data. This framework allows the construction of phenomenological but
concise models relying on mechanistic hypotheses and real observations. However, it
may lead to models with overly rigid behavior and possible data-model mismatches.
Hence, to avoid drawing a forecast grounded on a single PDE-based model that would
be prone to errors, we propose to apply Bayesian model averaging (BMA), which
allows us to account for both parameter and model uncertainties. Thus, we propose a
set of different competing PDE-based models for representing the pathogen dynam-
ics, we use an adaptive multiple importance sampling algorithm (AMIS) to estimate
parameters of each competing model from surveillance data in a mechanistic-statistical
framework, we evaluate the posterior probabilities of models by comparing different
approaches proposed in the literature, and we apply BMA to draw posterior distribu-
tions of parameters and a posterior forecast of the pathogen dynamics. This approach
is applied to predict the extent of Xylella fastidiosa in South Corsica, France, a phy-
topathogenic bacterium detected in situ in Europe less than 10 years ago (Italy 2013,
France 2015). Separating data into training and validation sets, we show that the BMA
forecast outperforms competing forecast approaches.
Origin | Files produced by the author(s) |
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Licence |
Public Domain
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