Industrial and Applied Math

Date: October 12, 2020

Time: 6:30PM - 7:30PM

Location: ZOOM

Speaker: Dr. Emma Goldberg, Theoretical Biology group at Los Alamos National Lab

Title: Inferring COVID-19 Epidemiology from the Phylogenetic Tree of Viral Relationships

Abstract: As a virus spreads from person to person, mutations arise in its genome and are transmitted to newly-infected people. This mutational trail of clues can be interpreted as a tree of relationships among viral samples taken from different people. The field of "phylodynamics" uses this type of data and applies mathematical models of viral growth and spread to estimate properties of an epidemic. I will discuss our efforts at phylodynamic modeling for the virus that causes COVID-19, focusing especially on identifying introductions of the virus into New Mexico and clusters of local spread within the state. By combining applied mathematical modeling with genetic sequencing technology and public health data, our team is uncovering actionable information about the spread of this virus.