This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: While the highly virulent avian influenza strain has only recently been discovered on Australian shores, researchers at Deakin University have been working behind the scenes for years, anticipating what an outbreak might look like. One of those researchers, Dr.
Sara Ryding at the Deakin Center for Marine Science, works predominantly with migratory shorebirds. She focuses on their movements, changes in movement patterns and what they might mean for disease risk for those birds and related species. Over the years, she has been modeling avian influenza outbreaks overseas and making predictions for Australia.
Her research paper co-authored by Dr. Tobias Ross and Professor Marcel Klaassen, published in Scientific Reports, examines the susceptibility of wild birds to bird flu. Bird flu has been present in nature for a long time—though mostly as low pathogenicity avian influenza (LPAI), which can cause mild respiratory and gastrointestinal infections in birds, among other effects.
Over time and under specific species pressures, such as the industrialization of poultry, these types of viruses can mutate to become high pathogenicity avian influenza (HPAI) strains, such as the HPAI H5N1 bird flu strain now affecting wildlife across the globe. As this virulent strain spreads, researchers like Ryding are monitoring the situation closely. "In terms of birds, the easier question might be, "Which birds can't be impacted by HPAI H5N1?" That said, there are traits that seem to increase the risk of exposure to the virus," Ryding says.
Key at-risk birds include seabirds like Australasian gannets, which nest in colonies; pink-eared ducks, whose aquatic foraging brings them into contact with other bird feces; birds of prey; and ravens and magpies that often scavenge dead or dying birds. "We have also seen huge impacts on marine mammals in South America, notably in sea lions. The good thing is that lots of species show some capacity for developing antibodies after exposure, helping them potentially resist the virus much better if they re-encounter it," Ryding says.
Understanding how birds move through the environment is key to helping scientists track how the virus spreads. "With any strain of bird flu, but perhaps especially HPAI H5N1, it moves through landscapes via the movements of wild birds," Ryding says. Ongoing research uses AviFluMap, an H5 bird flu wild bird model tool for Australia's wild birds.
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