Event 2     Middelfart (outside Copenhagen) Denmark 2008

Stochastic Differential Equation Models with Applications to the Insulin-Glucose System and Neuronal Modelling

Organizers: S. Ditlevsen, and M. Soerensen

August 3 to August 16, 2008

The event web page can be found   HERE

Scientific Focus
The focus of the event will be on exploring the theory and practice of modeling using stochastic methods. There is an increasing need to extend mathematical models of biological systems to models capable of describing more complex variations in the dynamics. In general, stochastic effects influence the dynamics, and may enhance or diminish or even completely change the dynamic behavior of the system. Real biological systems will always be subject to external and internal influences that are not fully understood or that cannot be explicitly modeled, and random noise offers a tractable way of taking account of these mechanisms. A natural extension of a deterministic differential equations model in continuous time is given by a stochastic differential equations model, where relevant parameters are modeled as random processes of some suitable form. This approach assumes that some degree of noise is present in the dynamics of the process. While there is broad research activity on mathematical models for biological systems as well as a well-developed theory of stochastic dynamical systems and their statistics, including parameter estimation, contacts between the two research communities have so far only been sporadic. The school aims to help bridge this gap by raising awareness of the possibilities offered by the theory of stochastic calculus for the solution of relevant biological problems. Necessary physiological background on the glucose-insulin system and the neuronal functioning will be provided, and stochastic models of these systems will be presented. Emphasis will be on stochastic integrate{}-and{}-fire models and stochastic differential equation models of the Euglycemic Hyperinsulinemic Clamp for determining insulin sensitivity.

Educational Focus
The school portion of the event will focus on providing the school participant with an understanding of techniques in theory and practice relevaant for modeling physiological control systems and developing useful applications to problems in the clinical setting. Instructors will include mathematicians, bio-engineers, and life scientists from academia and industry as well as medical clinicians.

Event Overview
The event consists of two components: (a) a 14 day summer school aimed at PhD and Post-Doc students (b) A 3 day scientific workshop with current researchers involved with the same scientific topic as the school. The last 3 days of the summer school are merged with the scientific workshop allowing students to learn about up to date research with current researchers in the field.