VCU to Co-Host the 2011 World Congress on Mathematical Modeling and Computational Simulation of Cardiovascular and Cardiopulmonary Dynamics

By Sathya Achia Abraham

Virginia Commonwealth University, together with the National Institutes of Heart, Lung and Blood and The College of William and Mary, will host the 2011 World Congress on Mathematical Modeling and Computer Simulation of Cardiovascular and Cardiopulmonary Dynamics, bringing together scientists from around the globe working to model the behavior of the circulatory systems.

The conference will be from May 31 to June 3, and will be hosted at The College of William & Mary, in Williamsburg. It will include plenary talks, scientific presentations, poster sessions, group discussions, panel presentations, as well as an art show and mathematical magic show.
 
“Advanced computing and mathematical models have become ubiquitous in the life sciences and medicine and is a rapidly growing area,” said conference chair and organizer Tarynn M. Witten, Ph.D., associate professor with the VCU Center for the Study of Biological Complexity.

“People do not realize how important this work is. It is the foundation of how pacemakers are designed, how cardiac stents are designed, how cardiac arrhythmias are predicted, and on and on,” she said.

In addition, VCU is collaborating with the Math Science Research Institute to offer a program on how to use cardiac modeling to teach mathematics in middle and high schools to make it more exciting for the students.

In 1994, Witten organized the first World Congress on Computational Medicine and Public Health at the Texas Advanced Computing Center. Approximately 550 participants from nearly 50 countries attended the three-day event.

The 2011 World Congress is supported by the National Institutes of Health’s National Institutes of Heart, Lung & Blood, the Center for the Study of Biological Complexity at VCU, the Biomathematics Program at the College of William & Mary and the Math Science Innovation Center.

Registration is required. For more information, visit http://www.vcu.edu/csbc/nhlbi/world11/register.html