Grups de recerca
19
feb
Seminari FMC: David Soriano Paños
En febrer tindrem la visita del Dr. David Soriano Paños que ens parlarà de: "Eco-evolutionary constraints shape the endemicity and epidemic trajectories of rapidly evolving viruses". Ens agradaria recordar que, als seminaris a l'aula 320, hi haurà dues maquines de càpsules de cafè disponibles per tots els assistents. Si us plau porteu la vostra pròpia tassa amb vosaltres!
Dates:
19-02-2026
Horari:
14:00
Lloc:
Room 320, 3rd floor of the Faculty of Physics, UB
Afegeix-ho a l'agenda (iCal)
Eco-evolutionary constraints shape the endemicity and epidemic trajectories of rapidly evolving viruses
Dr. David Soriano Paños
Departament d’Enginyeria Informàtica i Matemàtiques, Universitat Rovira i Virgili
Antigenic escape constitutes the main mechanism allowing rapidly evolving viruses to achieve endemicity. Beyond granting immune escape, empirical evidence also suggests that mutations of viruses might increase their inter-host transmissibility. While both mechanisms are well-studied individually, their combined effects on viral endemicity remain to be explored. In this talk I will introduce a minimal eco-evolutionary framework to simulate epidemic outbreaks generated by pathogens evolving both their infectiousness and immune escape. With this model, I will first show that contagions at the population level constrain the effective evolution of the virus, accelerating the increase in infectiousness in the first epidemic wave while favoring antigenic variation in the transition to the endemic phase. I will explain why the interplay between both evolutionary pathways favours the endemicity of viruses with lower baseline infectiousness. Finally, I will show that the networked structure of the antigenic space produces seasonal epidemic trajectories which capture the evolution of rapidly evolving viruses such as the H3N2 virus.
David Soriano Paños received his PhD in Physics from the University of Zaragoza in 2021. After holding an independent PONTE postdoctoral fellowship at the Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência, he currently holds a researcher position at Universitat Rovira i Virgili (URV). David’s research lies at the intersection of nonlinear dynamics, statistical physics, and network science. His most important research line focuses on the multiscale characterization of infectious diseases, exploring how processes ranging from viral evolution and immunity within organisms to socioeconomic factors and mobility at the population level jointly shape epidemic dynamics.
