Fall'98 Participants List   Winter'99 Participants List 

Significant applications of mathematics to biology have occurred for nearly a century, starting from the early work of Vito Volterra and Alfred Lotka on interacting populations, and maturing through fundamental work in population genetics (Haldane, Fisher, and Wright), epidemiology (Ross, Kermach and MacKendrick), development (Turing) and neurobiology (Hodgkin and Huxley, Fitzhugh and Nagumo, McCulloch and Pitts). Much of this research stimulated important contributions by other mathematicians (Kolmogorov, Petrovsky, Piscunox, Karlin, etc.); in general, however, until the past 10--20 years, communication between mathematicians and biologists remained problematical; much work in mathematical biology was relatively sterile, unsullied by contact with data, while experimental work suffered from a lack of theoretical generality.

The situation has changed dramatically in the past decade or so. Today's biologists are, in many areas, very sophisticated mathematically; mathematicians have learned the importance of becoming immersed in data; and the spectrum of practitioners has filled in, providing a continuum of highly mathematical work to collaborations. New and exciting areas (e.g. molecular biology, epidemiology and immunology) have opened up to mathematical investigations. A century of research has elucidated fundamental mechanisms in evolution, collective phenomena and pattern formation, and laid the foundations for more specialized modeling; and the development of new computational tools has greatly expanded the potential both for fundamental studies and for communications.

Thus the time is right for this special year at the IMA, built upon a selected series of workshops highlighting some of the mathematical challenges emerging from the consideration of biological issues, and endeavoring to show how the mathematics can be applied to the resolution of those issues. This program focuses on some particularly rich areas of investigation, complementing activities which have been carried out at the IMA in MRI, molecular biology and neurobiology in earlier years.

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Fall Quarter, September-December, 1998:
Theoretical Problems in Developmental Biology and Immunology

Winter Quarter, January-March, 1999:
Mathematical Problems in Physiology

Spring Quarter, April-June, 1999:
Dynamic Models of Ecosystems and Epidemics

Tutorial: Mathematical and Computational Issues in Pattern Formation, September 3-4, 1998

Workshop 1: Pattern Formation and Morphogenesis: The Basic Process, September 8-12, 1998

Workshop 2: Pattern Formation and Morphogenesis: Model Systems, September 14-18, 1998

Tutorial: Immunology, Cell Signaling, the Physiology of the Immune System and the Dynamics of the Immune Response, October 8-9, 1998

Workshop 3: Immune System Modeling & Cell Signaling, October 12-16, 1998

Period of Concentration: Forging an Appropriate Immune Response as a Problem in Distributed Artificial Intelligence, October 19-23, 1998

Tutorial: Mathematical Models of AIDS, November 6, 1998

Workshop 4: Dynamics and Control of AIDS, November 9-13, 1998

Minisymposium: Cancer, November 15-19, 1998

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Workshop 5: Cell Adhesion and Motility, January 4-8, 1999

Workshop 6: Computational Modeling in Biological Fluid Dynamics, January 25-29, 1999

Workshop 7: Membrane Transport and Renal Physiology, February 8-12, 1999

Tutorial: Endocrinology: Mechanism of Hormone Secretion and Control, February 14, 1999

Workshop 8: Endocrinology: Mechanism of Hormone Secretion and Control, February 15-19, 1999

Tutorial: Audition, March 5, 1999

Workshop 9: Audition, March 8-12, 1999

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Workshop 10: Local Interaction and Global Phenomena in Vegetation and Other Systems, April 19-23, 1999

"HOT TOPICS" Workshop: Challenges and Opportunities in Genomics: Production, Storage, Mining and Use April 24-27, 1999

Tutorial: Introduction to Epidemiology and Immunology, May 13-14, 1999

Workshop 11: Mathematical Approaches for Emerging and Reemerging Infectious Diseases, May 17-21, 1999

Workshop 12: From Individual to Aggregation: Modeling Animal Grouping, June 7-11, 1999

"HOT TOPICS" Workshop: Decision Making Under Uncertainty: Energy and Environmental Models , July 20-24, 1999

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