Gloucester Branch - 'Fighting disease with mathematics'
Cheltenham

14 October 2015

Venue: Cheltenham Ladies College, Bayshill Road, Cheltenham, GL50 3EP

Time: 7.30pm

Subject: "Fighting disease with mathematics"

Speaker: Dr Sara Jabbari, School of Mathematics and Centre for Systems Biology, University of Birmingham

How can mathematics be used to understand antibiotic resistance, track the dynamics of bacterial infections or even develop new drugs to tackle disease? As our knowledge of diseases becomes increasingly detailed and complex, more tools are required to interpret and use this information. Mathematical modelling is one such tool. Differential equations can be employed to simulate and understand disease mechanisms, venturing into places that experimental work cannot go, be that for practical, financial or even moral reasons. We explore a range of examples illustrating how the field of population dynamics can be used to understand disease, improve existing treatments and create entirely new ones.

Contact: Dr Jeff Ralph