Featuring contributions from the eighth International Conference on Modelling in Medicine and Biology, this volume covers a broad spectrum of topics including the application of computers to simulate biomedical phenomena. It will be of interest to medical and physical scientists and engineers.
The idea of preparing this volume originated from the ever increasing importance of computational modelling of complex problems in medicine. Considerable advances have been made in this area as demonstrated by the continued success of the International Conference on Modelling in Medicine and Biology organised by the Wessex Institute of Technology.The work reported at those meetings and the research carried out at the Wessex Institute of Technology indicated the increasing interaction and collaboration between medical and engineering scientists. Advances presented at these conferences are now being used in practice for a wide range of medical and surgical applications.The considerable improvements and evolution of the field has led to some of the best scientists, who have participated in our conferences, to write an article on their most recent research. This has led to thirteen outstanding articles published in this volume which encompass important areas of biomedical modelling.
This book contains contributions from the tenth International Conference on Modelling in Medicine and Biology. The advances covered in the computer modelling, and computational methods and measurements, and their integration, have applications in the study of orthopaedics, cardiovascular systems biomechanics and electrical simulation, amongst others, and are leading to progress in medical care and treatment.
This volume contains a collection of papers from the research program “Protective Artificial Respiration (PAR)”. In 2005 the German Research Association DFG launched the research program PAR which is a joint initiative of medicine and fluid mechanics. The main long-term objective of this program is the development of a more protective artificial respiratory system to reduce the physical stress of patients undergoing artificial respiration. To satisfy this goal 11 projects have been defined. In each of these projects scientists from medicine and fluid mechanics do collaborate in several experimental and numerical investigations to improve the fundamental knowledge on respiration and to develop a more individual artificial breathing concept.
Following on the success of the first conference, the Wessex Institute of Technology is convening the Second International Conference on Physical Coastal Processes, Management and Engineering. This book contains papers to be presented at that Conference. Coastal zone dynamics involve distinctive features that stem from both near shore hydrodynamics, and the complex local behaviour of the atmosphere that is affected by the irregularity of the coastal topography and variations in land sea surface roughness and thermal properties. Complex interactions occur between the atmosphere, ocean and land, leading to large temporal and spatial differences in air-sea exchange processes and wind strength and direction. Recreational and tourism demand on coastal areas activities makes increased shore and beach protection necessary. Coastlines are often subjected to direct impact of wind, swell and storm wave activity. Many other physical phenomena, such as tides and associated currents, long waves and storm surges, also affect the dynamic behaviour of the coastal zone. With the increase in extreme events due to climate change, the role of extreme events in changing coastal zones needs to be considered. The International Conference will consider also of these and will cover such topics as: Wave modelling; Wave transformation hydrodynamics; Extreme events and sea level rise; Sea defences; Interaction between coastal defences and processes; Energy recovery; Hydrodynamic forces; Sediment transport and erosion; Pollution and dispersion; Planning and beach design; Coastal geomorphology; Coastal processes and navigation; Coastal processes and GIS; Bio-physical coastal processes; and Great Lakes problems. The book will be of interest to engineers and government officials involved with coastal zone management and development
During the last 30 years, many chemical compounds that are active against tumors have been discovered or developed. At the same time, new methods of testing drugs for cancer therapy have evolved. nefore 1964, drug testing on animal tumors was directed to observation of the incfease in life span of the host after a single dose. A new approach, in which the effects of multiple doses on the proliferation kinetics of the tumor in vivo as well as of cell lines in vitro are investigated, has been outlined by Skipper and his co-workers in a series of papers beginning in 1964 (Skipper, Schabel and Wilcox, 1964 and 1965). They also investigated the influence of the time schedule in the treatment of experimental tumors. Since the publication of those studies, cell population kinetics cannot be left out of any discussion of the rational basis of chemotherapy. When clinical oncologists began to apply cell kinetic concepts in practice about 15 years ago, the theoretical basis was still very poor, in spite of Skipper's progress, and the lack of re levant cytokinetic and pharmacologic data was apparent. Subsequently, much theoretical work has been done and many cell kinetic models have been elaborated (for a review see Eisen, 1977).
The use of probabilistic methods in the biological sciences has been so well established by now that mathematical biology is regarded by many as a distinct dis cipline with its own repertoire of techniques. The purpose of the Workshop on sto chastic methods in biology held at Nagoya University during the week of July 8-12, 1985, was to enable biologists and probabilists from Japan and the U. S. to discuss the latest developments in their respective fields and to exchange ideas on the ap plicability of the more recent developments in stochastic process theory to problems in biology. Eighteen papers were presented at the Workshop and have been grouped under the following headings: I. Population genetics (five papers) II. Measure valued diffusion processes related to population genetics (three papers) III. Neurophysiology (two papers) IV. Fluctuation in living cells (two papers) V. Mathematical methods related to other problems in biology, epidemiology, population dynamics, etc. (six papers) An important feature of the Workshop and one of the reasons for organizing it has been the fact that the theory of stochastic differential equations (SDE's) has found a rich source of new problems in the fields of population genetics and neuro biology. This is especially so for the relatively new and growing area of infinite dimensional, i. e. , measure-valued or distribution-valued SDE's. The papers in II and III and some of the papers in the remaining categories represent these areas.
This volume contains a selection of papers presented at the work shop "Modelling of Patterns in Space and Time", organized by the 80nderforschungsbereich 123, "8tochastische Mathematische Modelle", in Heidelberg, July 4-8, 1983. The main aim of this workshop was to bring together physicists, chemists, biologists and mathematicians for an exchange of ideas and results in modelling patterns. Since the mathe matical problems arising depend only partially on the particular field of applications the interdisciplinary cooperation proved very useful. The workshop mainly treated phenomena showing spatial structures. The special areas covered were morphogenesis, growth in cell cultures, competition systems, structured populations, chemotaxis, chemical precipitation, space-time oscillations in chemical reactors, patterns in flames and fluids and mathematical methods. The discussions between experimentalists and theoreticians were especially interesting and effective. The editors hope that these proceedings reflect at least partially the atmosphere of this workshop. For the convenience of the reader, the papers are ordered alpha betically according to authors. However, the table of contents can easily be grouped into the main topics of the workshop. For practical reasons it was not possible to reproduce in colour the beautiful pictures of patterns shown at the workshop. Since a larger number of half-tone pictures could be included in this volume, the loss of information has, however, been kept to a minimum. The workshop has already stimulated cooperation between its parti cipants and this volume is intended to spread this effect.
" . . . behavior is not, what an organism does itself, but to what we point. Therefore, whether a type of behavior of an organism is adequate as a certain configuration of movements, will depend on the environment in which we de scribe it. " (Humberto Maturana, Francisco Varela: El arbol del conocimiento, 1984) "A thorough analysis of behavior must result in a scheme, that shows all regularities that are to be found between the sensorical input and the motorical output of an animal. This scheme is an abstract representation of the brain. " (Valentin Braitenberg: Gehirngespinste, 1973) During the 70ies, when Biomathematics (beyond Biomedical Statistics and Com puting) became more popular at universities and research institutes, the problems dealt with came mainly from the general fields of 'Population Biology' and 'Complex Systems Analysis' such as epidemics, ecosystems analysis, morphogenesis, genetics, immunology and neurology (see the first series of Springer Lecture Notes in Biomathematics). Since then, the picture has not considerably changed, and it seems that "a thorough analysis of behavior" of single organisms and, moreover, of their mutual interactions, is far from being understood. On the contrary, mathematical modellers and analysts have been well advised to restrict their investigations to specific aspects of 'biological behavior', one of which is 'biological motion'. Until now, only a few Conference Proceedings or Lecture Notes have paid attention to this important aspect, some of the earlier examples being Vol. 24: 'The measurement of biological shape and shape changes' (1978) or Vol.
This volume represents the edited proceedings of the International Symposium on Mathematical Biology held in Kyoto, November 10-15, 1985. The symposium was or ganized by an international committee whose members are: E. Teramoto, M. Yamaguti, S. Amari, S.A. Levin, H. Matsuda, A. Okubo, L.M. Ricciardi, R. Rosen, and L.A. Segel. The symposium included technical sessions with a total of 11 invited papers, 49 contributed papers and a poster session where 40 papers were displayed. These Proceedings consist of selected papers from this symposium. This symposium was the second Kyoto meeting on mathematical topics in biology. The first was held in conjunction with the Sixth International Biophysics Congress in 1978. Since then this field of science has grown enormously, and the number of scientists in the field has rapidly increased. This is also the case in Japan. About 80 young japanese scientists and graduate students participated this time. . The sessions were divided into 4 ; , categories: 1) Mathematical Ecology and Population Biology, 2) Mathematical Theory of Developmental Biology and Morphogenesis, 3) Theoretical Neurosciences, and 4) Cell Kinetics and Other Topics. In every session, there were stimulating and active discussions among the participants. We are convinced that the symposium was highly successful in transmitting scientific information across disciplines and in establishing fruitful contacts among the participants. We owe this success to the cooperation of all participants.