Period of Funding: 1 January 2024 to 31 December 2027
| Link to Project Website | https://www.zoe-project.eu |
| Project Number | 101135094 |
| Funding Agency | EU Horizon Europe |
| Lead Organization Name | Charité Universitaetmedizin Berlin |
| Lead Organization Country | Germany |
| Link to Lead Organization Website | www.charite.de |
| Link to Open Science Framework (OSF) public page | https://osf.io/y5sp7/ |
Changes in biodiversity associated with ecosystem degradation are increasingly recognized as an important driver for the emergence and spread of infectious diseases in wildlife, domestic animals, and humans. Anthropogenic activities often lead to land use and land cover changes from natural, biodiverse habitats to homogenized and biotically depleted landscapes. These landscapes are characterized by impoverished wild species communities that demonstrate resilience to anthropogenic pressures and tend to favour generalist, synanthropic and commensal hosts and vectors of zoonotic diseases.
The ZOE consortium aims at advancing the understanding of the effects of ecosystem degradation in the form of deforestation and associated biodiversity loss on the risk of emergence of zoonotic and vector-borne diseases, and at better defining the protective value of forest ecosystem restoration. It fully embraces a holistic, integrated, inter- and transdisciplinary One Health approach to the links between human, animal, and environmental health.
List of Partner Institutions:
| Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Universitaet Hannover | Germany |
www.uni-hannover.de |
| Biomedicinske Centrum Slovenskej Akademie Vied, Verejna Vyskumna Institucia | Slovakia | www.uni-hannover.de |
| Fraunhofer Gesellschaft zur Forderung der Angewandten Forschung Ev | Germany | www.fraunhofer.de |
| Universidad del Valle de Guatemala | Guatemala | www.uvg.edu.gt |
| Universitat Wien | Austria | www.univie.ac.at |
| Univerza v Ljubljani | Slovenia | www.uni-lj.si |
| Universitaet Potsdam | Germany | www.uni-potsdam.de |
| Pikado B.V | Netherlands | www.pikadobv.com |
| Universidad de Costa Rica | Costa Rica | www.ucr.ac.cr |
| Universidade da Coruna | Spain | www.udc.es |
| Universite d’aix Marseille | France | www.univ-amu.fr |
| Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico | Mexico | www.unam.mx |
| Centro de Investigacion y de Estudios Avanzados del Instituto Politecnico Naciona | Mexico | www.cinvestav.mx |
| Wildlife Conservation Society | USA | www.wcs.org |
List of Sampling Locations:
| Costa Rica | Canton de Mora, San Jose Province |
| Guatemala | Guatemala, Tikal National Park, Petén Department |
| Mexico | Puuc Biocultural Reserve, Yucatán State |
| Slovakia | Bratislava Region |
| Slovenia | Prestanek, Municipality of Postojna |
Field of action:
Animal (Invertebrates [Arthropods: Insects, Arachnids], Vertebrates [Rodents]), Plants (Canopy, Understory, Grass), Microbes/Parasites (Viral, Bacterial, Unicellular eukaryotes), Environments (Tropical rainforest, Tropical dry forest, Temperate forest), Environmental changes (Deforestation, Urbanization, Agriculture, Ranching, Reforestation, Restoration), Disease metrics (Seroprevalence [animal], Seroprevalence [human], Prevalence [animal], Genomics)
