This assignment will be due on Wednesday March 6 and is the final group assignment. Due to our successful kakapo modeling our consulting firm has been commissioned to work on a new project, that of assessing the current understanding of the malaria epidemic and making educated proposals about which direction humanity should take regarding the strategies used to control the spread of this very serious disease. This is particularly relevant at this time since several methods of controlling the epidemic are being explored by the scientific community (here is a very recent example and here is a "dynamic" exploration the method of "sticky bump control"). Your group will need to carefully collect and articulate the factors involved in the spread of malaria as well a some of the methods used (or proposed to be used) in order to control the spread of malaria. (There is a vast literature on this subject, here is a web based example complete with gobs of links, below is a list of "references through the ages".) After collecting this information your group will need to model the spread of malaria using differential equations and then assess how the proposed controls will affect the model. In the end you should attempt to conclude how the proposed control strategies are likely to affect the infected population and decide upon which strategies look the most promising (which should include commentary about issues such as a strategy's cost and feasibility).
A brief list of starter references, "References Through the Ages":
(2002) Wengelnik, K. et al. A class of potent antimalarials and their specific accumulation on infected erythrocytes. Science, 295, 1311 - 1314.
(2000) Hatings, I.M. Modeling a predictable disaster: The rise and spread of malaria throughout the ages. Parasitology Today, 6,340-347.
(1997) Greenwood, B.M. The epidemiology of malaria. Annals of Tropical Medicine and Parasitology, 91, 763-769.
(1980) Kreier, Julius P. epidemiology, Chemotherapy, Morphology, and Metabolism. New York: Academic Press.
(1976) Bruce-Chawatt, L. J. Mathematical models in the epidemiology and control of malaria. Tropical and Geographic Medicine, 28, 1-8.
(1975) Olaofe, G. Oluremi. A simple model for tropical malaria epidemics. Mathematical Biosciences, 25, 205-215.
(1955) Macdonald, G. The measurement of equilibrium in malaria. Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine, 48, 295-301.