Between the years 2006-2007, Harris County, located at the heart of the
Houston metropolitan area, experienced a nearly 90% decline in the number of female
mosquitoes which tested positive for the West Nile virus. Different theories exist as to
why such a precipitous drop occurred and this study attempts to determine the extent to
which climatic variability between the two years played a role. The Mosquito Control
Division of Harris County Public Health and Environmental Services gathered the data
on vectors and reservoirs. Then using GIS, spatial analysis, and geostatistical tools the
vector and reservoir data was compared to climatic data to investigate any changes in
viral distribution.
Previous studies of the area until now have used a limited amount of climatic
data; this study seeks to improve the resolution of climatic data analyzed. A higher
resolution of data was achieved by including as-of-yet unused data from a network of
over 150 gauges maintained by various state and local agencies in addition to
previously used data from NOAA COOP stations. Using this dense network of station's
values for precipitation, temperature and other climatic variables were interpolated for
all of Harris County and used in the analysis. Based on results, water availability was the most likely out of all the climatic
variables to the precipitous drop of West Nile virus positive female mosquitoes from
2006-2007. Correlations between all climatic variables and mosquito abundance and
West Nile virus positives showed mixed results compared to a previous study in the
same area.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:tamu.edu/oai:repository.tamu.edu:1969.1/ETD-TAMU-2009-05-794 |
| Date | 2009 May 1900 |
| Creators | Berhane, Stephen |
| Contributors | Sui, Daniel |
| Source Sets | Texas A and M University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Book, Thesis, Electronic Thesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
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