Probing the effects of the well-mixed assumption on viral infection dynamics

Authored by Catherine Beauchemin

Date Published: 2006-09-21

DOI: 10.1016/j.jtbi.2006.03.014

Sponsors: MITACS United States National Institutes of Health (NIH)

Platforms: MASyV

Model Documentation: Other Narrative Flow charts

Model Code URLs: Model code not found

Abstract

Viral kinetics have been extensively studied in the past through the use of spatially well-mixed ordinary differential equations describing the time evolution of the diseased state. However, emerging spatial structures such as localized populations of dead cells might adversely affect the spread of infection, similar to the manner in which a counter-fire can stop a forest fire from spreading. In a previous publication [Beauchemin, C., Samuel, J., Tuszynski, J., 2005. A simple cellular automaton model for influenza A viral infections. J. Theor. Biol. 232(2), 223-234], a simple two-dimensional cellular automaton model was introduced and shown to be accurate enough to model an uncomplicated infection with influenza A. Here, this model is used to investigate the effects of relaxing the well-mixed assumption. Particularly, the effects of the initial distribution of infected cells, the regeneration rule for dead epithelial cells, and the proliferation rule for immune cells are explored and shown to have an important impact on the development and outcome of the viral infection in our model. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Tags
Agent-based models Cellular automaton Spatial heterogeneity individual-based models mathematical modelling viral infection dynamics well-mixed assumption Mechanisms In-vitro Mathematical-model Propagation Lymph-nodes Motility Vivo Influenza-a-virus Dendritic cells