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Metabolic pathway
modeling
Dr. Previs and Dr. Alexander use stable isotope tracer methods and
mathematical modeling to quantify rates of biochemical flux. The
studies are aimed at understanding the integration of biochemical
pathways on the level of the whole body, e.g. how does the level of
carbohydrate intake affect the production of triglycerides, how does
the level of energy and nitrogen intake affect protein synthesis? ...
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Analysis of multiunit spike train
data The analysis of spike train data is a fundamental problem in
neuroscience. Two different aspects of this problem lead to two
complementary projects. The first project is to develop methods for
recognizing individual spikes in extracellular recordings from an
invertebrate nerve tract... |
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The biomechanics of Aplysia
mouth movements
How do neural control and biomechanics interact
during control? To address this question, students
will analyze the biomechanics and neural control of
a well-studied system, the feeding apparatus of
Aplysia, and develop mathematical and computational
models of the structure, as well as of its neural
control. |
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The ecology of malaria and filariasis
In collaboration with the Departments of Biology and Mathematics, the
Case Center for Global Health and Diseases has several ongoing
projects to model the impact of malaria and filariasis transmission on
mosquito and humans populations living in diverse ecosystems in Papua
New Guinea. Disease dynamics in this system are complex: the malaria
and filariasis parasites compete for human hosts. In addition, there
are four strains of malaria parasite... |
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Single cell psychophysics: gradient
sensing in neutrophils
P. Thomas (Mathematics, Biology & Cognitive Science) and H. Baskaran
(Chemical Engineering & Biomedical Engineering) have formed a new
collaboration investigate quantitatively the dynamics of information
processing and decision making in biochemical signaling networks
controlling eukaryotic chemotaxis. The proposed work will combine
experimental, computational and theoretical approaches to studying the
chemotactic response to precise spatially and temporally controlled
chemical stimuli. Specified spatiotemporal patterns of chemical
signals will be prepared by a microfabricated fluidic control device.
Single cell responses will be measured through cell motility assays
and fluorescence measurements of intracellular signaling protein
spatial distributions... |
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Cognitive networks and memory
Despite decades of research into the nature of memory, many basic
questions about the mechanisms of learning, information storage and
retrieval in the human brain remain unanswered. In the proposed
year-long RIBMS project, a team of two undergraduate students will
work with an interdisciplinary team at the Memory and Cognition Center
at Case Western Reserve University to study fundamental mechanisms of
memory based on analysis of controlled word association and recall
tasks. Specifically, the students will develop computational models
and analyze experimental data to explore the concept of semantic space
from both mathematical and biological perspectives.... |
