FIGHT AGAINST CANCER 

Every year, almost 20 million people worldwide get diagnosed with cancer. As the incidence and mortality rate of cancer is rapidly growing worldwide, BioDynaMo represents a unique opportunity to advance precision medicine in oncology.  

If we could better plan and adjust treatments to the patient in a personalised way, the impact of medical intervention could be enhanced, and side effects reduced. Hence, the sooner we use advanced computational methods such as BioDynaMo for innovating medical therapy in oncology, the more we can help patients.

BioDynaMo uses an agent-based modelling approach, highly pertinent to model biological tissue in great detail. It can model cancer cells, healthy cells, immune cells, diffusing substances, and much more. Based on these processes, BioDynaMo allows us to model cancer growth and response to treatment in a 3D physical environment for a single patient and therefore capture its dynamics in a highly realistic manner, allowing individual treatment optimisation.

The technology is very performing from a computational perspective. The growth of cancer depends on millions of cells that mechanically interact, proliferate, secrete substances and die. As a result, both cancer cells and healthy cells need to be modelled due to their constant communication processes – which requires sophisticated software such as BioDynaMo.

FIGHT AGAINST DENGUE

Mosquito-borne-diseases cause 212 million cases per year worldwide. Along with this huge morbidity, it conveys a significant economic burden, which has been estimated to be tens of billion dollars worldwide yearly just for dengue.

With a key role to play in transferring various pathogens from animal reservoirs to humans, the mosquito habitat is expected to grow during the current global climate context, which will lead to an increased risk of mosquito-borne-diseases in areas where they are currently negligible, such as in many European countries.

In the pandemic scenario in which the world lives, it is more important than ever to invest in ways to mitigate the impact of epidemics. In addition to COVID-19, several diseases affect populations every year leaving victims, and among them, dengue stands out greatly. In this context, the development and application of computer models to simulate the spread of diseases become highly relevant.

Computational models enable the study of possible scenarios of direct and indirect transmission, supporting public decision-makers in prevention, mitigation or control strategies – with the aim of significantly reducing the number of casualties and economic burden of treatment. Through BioDynaMo, we aim to create an agent-based model that can finely represent and simulate not only the dynamics of mosquito populations in urban settings but also the transmission dynamics of the disease.

Intended to serve communities around the world, BioDynaMo would act as an efficient agent-based model for dengue transmission in radically different settings taking into account environmental factors, human immunology and behaviour, to showcase realistic and customized scenarios for dengue control and elimination.

FIGHT AGAINST INEQUALITIES

BioDynaMo is a technology that equips countries to function and govern effectively by allowing them to understand the characteristics of the population and accordingly suggest possible interventions and solutions.

The technology will help in creating a more resilient society by an improved understanding of societal and economic responses. BioDynaMo for the purpose of urban planning will be used to model various scenarios related to socio-economic inequality that will support governments to facilitate better decision making.