How fast are viruses spreading in the wild?

Genomic data collected from viral outbreaks can be exploited to reconstruct the dispersal history of viral lineages in a two-dimensional space using continuous phylogeographic inference. These spatially explicit reconstructions can subsequently be used to estimate dispersal metrics that can be informative of the dispersal dynamics and the capacity to spread among hosts. Heterogeneous sampling efforts of genomic sequences can however impact the accuracy of phylogeographic dispersal metrics.

Modeling the velocity of evolving lineages and predicting dispersal patterns.

Accurate estimation of the dispersal velocity or speed of evolving organisms is no mean feat. In fact, existing probabilistic models in phylogeography or spatial population genetics generally do not provide an adequate framework to define velocity in a relevant manner. For instance, the very concept of instantaneous speed simply does not exist under one of the most popular approaches that models the evolution of spatial coordinates as Brownian trajectories running along a phylogeny.

Modeling the velocity of evolving lineages and predicting dispersal patterns.

Accurate estimation of the dispersal velocity or speed of evolving organisms is no mean feat. In fact, existing probabilistic models in phylogeography or spatial population genetics generally do not provide an adequate framework to define velocity in a relevant manner. For instance, the very concept of instantaneous speed simply does not exist under one of the most popular approaches that models the evolution of spatial coordinates as Brownian trajectories running along a phylogeny (Lemey et al.

How fast are viruses spreading in the wild?

Genomic data collected from viral outbreaks can be exploited to reconstruct the dispersal history of viral lineages in a two-dimensional space using continuous phylogeographic inference. These spatially explicit reconstructions can subsequently be used to estimate dispersal metrics allowing to unveil the dispersal dynamics and evaluate the capacity to spread among hosts. Heterogeneous sampling intensity of genomic sequences can however impact the accuracy of dispersal insights gained through phylogeographic inference.