Basic to the idea of นิเวศวิทยาโรค is the understanding that the spatial and temporal distribution of a disease is a factor of interacting populations (hosts and pathogens) with their shared environments (abiotic, biotic, and social). (See the Kathmandu example, and the cases in Waltner-Toews et al 2008). Those multi-dimensional environmental conditions that affect where and when a species (or disease) can survive are together known as a niche.