Disease ecology
Disease ecology is a sub-discipline of ecology concerned with the mechanisms, patterns, and effects of host-pathogen interactions, particularly those of infectious diseases, within the context of environmental factors Disease ecology operates under the assumption that host-pathogen interactions can be conceptually united with other interspecific interactions, such as predation or parasitism.
While the field is often defined within the context of ecology as a whole, disease ecology relates ideas from a wide variety of medical and biological disciplines including immunology, epidemiology, and genetics.