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Full-Text Articles in Diseases
Modeling Immune System Dynamics During Hiv Infection And Treatment With Differential Equations, Nicole Rychagov
Modeling Immune System Dynamics During Hiv Infection And Treatment With Differential Equations, Nicole Rychagov
CODEE Journal
An inquiry-based project that discusses immune system dynamics during HIV infection using differential equations is presented. The complex interactions between healthy T-cells, latently infected T-cells, actively infected T-cells, and the HIV virus are modeled using four nonlinear differential equations. The model is adapted to simulate long term HIV dynamics, including the AIDS state, and is used to simulate the long term effects of the traditional antiretroviral therapy (ART). The model is also used to test viral rebound over time of combined application of ART and a new drug that blocks the reactivation of the viral genome in the infected cells …
The Battle Against Malaria: A Teachable Moment, Randy K. Schwartz
The Battle Against Malaria: A Teachable Moment, Randy K. Schwartz
Journal of Humanistic Mathematics
Malaria has been humanity’s worst public health problem throughout recorded history. Mathematical methods are needed to understand which factors are relevant to the disease and to develop counter-measures against it. This article and the accompanying exercises provide examples of those methods for use in lower- or upper-level courses dealing with probability, statistics, or population modeling. These can be used to illustrate such concepts as correlation, causation, conditional probability, and independence. The article explains how the apparent link between sickle cell trait and resistance to malaria was first verified in Uganda using the chi-squared probability distribution. It goes on to explain …