Berlin 2015 – scientific programme

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DY: Fachverband Dynamik und Statistische Physik

DY 20: Focus Session: Complex Contagion Phenmomena (joint session SOE/ DY/ BP)

DY 20.8: Talk

Tuesday, March 17, 2015, 12:30–12:45, MA 001

Spatio-temporal dynamics of the cholera epidemic of 1831/1832 in Austria — •Michael Leitner¹ and Gero Vogl² — ¹Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Zentrum (MLZ), Technische Universität München, Lichtenbergstr. 1, 85748 Garching, Germany — ²Fakultät für Physik, Universität Wien, Boltzmanngasse 5, 1090 Wien, Austria

Caused by large-scale troop movements in the Russian empire, cholera reached Europe in 1830 and caused the first cholera pandemic to affect the western world. Within the confined region of Weinviertel in Lower Austria (approx. 5000 km²), first cases were registered in 1831, while major outbreaks followed in the summer months of 1832. We reconstructed the dynamics of the disease from the causes of death in the clerical burial records on the temporal scale of single days and spatial scale of single villages. We analyze the data in terms of connectivity, both concerning geographical distance and bodies of flowing water. In contrast to analyzes of recent epidemics, we hope to obtain finer-resolution information on the dynamics due to the lower human mobility in past times.