Maud Menten Institute / Mathematical and Statistical Biology Seminar: Thomas Hillen

The mathematical modelling of MS so far has focused on a few aspects of the disease, but an overall modelling framework is missing. Here we propose a paradigm for the mathematical modelling of MS. Based on biological principles we propose s sequence of mathematical models for MS. We begin with the healthy state, look at the MS prodrome and we show that periodic disease outbreaks are possible in this framework. We also include the presence of Epstein-Barr virus infections as MS initiator and disease promoters such as low levels of estrogen, low levels of vitamin D, and mutations in the HLA-DR gene. Most importantly, we find that memory B-cells play a dominant role in the disease progression. (Joint work with A.J. Jenner, QUT).