MBI Emphasis Year on Stochastics in Biological Systems
July 2011 - June 2012
Organizing Committee
Stochasticity is fundamental to biological systems. While in many situations the system can be viewed as a large number of similar agents interacting in a homogeneously mixing environment so the dynamics are captured well by ordinary differential equations or other deterministic models. In many more situations, the system can be driven by a small number of agents or strongly influenced by an environment fluctuating in space or time. Stochastic fluctuations are critical in the initial stages of an epidemic; a small number of molecules may determine the direction of cellular processes; changing climate may alter the balance among competing populations. Spatial models may be required when agents are distributed in space and interactions between agents form a network. Systems evolve to become more robust or co-evolve in response to competitive or host-pathogen interactions. Consequently, models must allow agents to change and interact in complex ways. Stochasticity increases the complexity of models in some ways, but may smooth and simplify in others.
Events 2011-2012
