Using Mathematical Models to Track the Spread of COVID-19

Tracking how COVID-19 spreads has become one of the best tools for containing the disease. NSM mathematics professors William Fitzgibbon and Jeff Morgan, along with a team of researchers, have developed a dynamic mathematical model of a COVID-19 epidemic. Their model incorporates an asymptomatic infectious stage and a symptomatic infectious stage.

The group, which also includes researchers from Vanderbilt University and Middle Tennessee State University, used data to analyze and predict the spread of COVID-19 in Brazil. They have published two papers on the topic.

The collaborators at Vanderbilt and Middle Tennessee State focus on numerical analysis “to show that the mathematical model actually does mimic the aspects of the disease that you’re hoping to capture,” said Morgan.

“The second paper begins to develop the methodology and the underlying mathematics to describe the spatial spread,” Fitzgibbon said.

Fitzgibbon and Morgan have a third research paper in the works. This research paper will look at the different ways that people and the disease are moving about various regions in Brazil.

Read more about this innovative research and access the research paper in its entirety.