Dr Theo Pepler

I am an applied statistician and research associate at the University of Glasgow. My research experience is in multivariate statistics (in particular principal component analysis), the bootstrap and other resampling methods, nonparametric statistics, biostatistics, and statistical epidemiology. In the past, I have worked as a lecturer in Statistics and Biometry, and in 2014 completed my PhD in Statistics at Stellenbosch University in South Africa.

Within the EPIC programme, I study how animal movements contribute to infectious disease spread (Topic 2). By combining epidemiological simulation models with observed animal movement data, I aim to identify the agricultural premises potentially playing key roles in future epidemic outbreaks. Knowledge of these key premises is helpful in planning surveillance and control strategies for infectious animal disease in Scotland.

As a proponent of free software and the open science movement, I am passionate about development of sustainable and future-proof data analysis pipelines. This will contribute to ensure the quantitative modelling legacy of the EPIC programme (Topic 1).

Laboratory-based evaluation of a simplified point-of-care test intended to support treatment decisions in non-severe bovine clinical mastitis. Journal of Dairy Research. Francisco B. Malcata , P. Theo Pepler* , Ruth N. Zadoks and Lorenzo Viora 

Multi‑species temporal network of livestock movements for disease spread. A-S. Ruget, G. Rossi, P.T. Pepler, G. Beaunée, C.J. Banks, J. Enright R.R. Kao