Immunoepidemiology - bridging the gap between immunology and epidemiology

' Immunoepidemiology ' combines individual- and population-oriented approac hes to create new perspectives. It examines how inter-individual difference s in immune responses affect the population dynamics of micro- and macro-pa rasites to produce the epidemiological patterns of infection observed in he terogeneous host populations. Here, I discuss how research has only just be gun to tap the potential of this integrative discipline that incorporates i mmunology, parasitology, genetics, epidemiology, ecology, mathematical mode lling and statistics.