Scientists will be challenging the public this week to pit their powers of prediction against the latest computer simulations. A brand new interactive exhibit will be displayed at the Royal Society's summer science exhibition that showcases the value of mathematical models in the fight to prevent and control diseases such as bluetongue.
Members of the public will be invited to come up with ideas for controlling the spread of infectious diseases of crops and livestock, which they can then test to find out if their plans would be likely to work in real life. The exhibition entitled "Are epidemics inevitable? Disease prevention and control in changing landscapes" is funded by the UK Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) and involves five scientists from the University of Cambridge, the Institute for Animal Health, and Rothamsted Research.
Professor Chris Gilligan from the University of Cambridge said: "Mathematical modelling is crucial to our ability to prevent and control infectious diseases such as bluetongue. We have developed a simple generic computer model with a small number of variables, which can be tailored to a variety of specific infections. We hope that visitors to our exhibition will be able to see how powerful our mathematical model is in disease prevention and control."
Dr Simon Gubbins from the Institute for Animal Health said: "We hope to demonstrate to the public that by using mathematics we can evaluate disease risks and likely direction of outbreaks, establish the need for intervention measures, predict the effectiveness of different control strategies and assist with the optimal allocation of resources between surveillance and intervention."
Dr Erik DeSimone, also from the University of Cambridge, added: "When we are under threat from a possible disease invasion we can use our models to predict what could happen. We can't say exactly what will happen, but we can say with some confidence what are the chances of different outcomes."