Eco-epidemiological predator–prey models: A review of models in ordinary differential equations

Abstract

Eco-epidemiology integrates ecological and epidemiological approaches to analyze both the impact of infectious diseases on ecological communities and how interspecific interactions can alter disease dynamics. With the aim of extracting general principles of eco-epidemiological dynamics, this article presents a review of the literature focusing on predator–prey type ordinary differential equation models with disease in one of the species. We included 81 articles that were categorized according to prey growth function, disease transmission function, epidemiological model compartments, and predator functional response. The findings reveal that these models share a common mathematical lineage, which in turn facilitates the construction of models based on the general assumptions identified in this study. The most prevalent models tend to assume logistic prey growth, a bilinear incidence rate for disease transmission, an epidemiological model of the Susceptible–Infected type, and a Holling Type II predator functional response.