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Thematic Program on Mathematical and
Quantitative Oncology
July - August 2008
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Organizing Committee:
S. Sivaloganathan, Chair (Waterloo & CMM)
L. Estrada (VICBC)
M. Kohandel (Waterloo & CMM)
I. Pressman (Carleton & CMM)
H.M. Zhu (York)
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Scientific Advisory Committee:
A. Friedman (Director Math Biosciences Institute, Ohio)
T. Hudson (Director OICR, Toronto)
P. Maini (Director, Centre for Math Biology, Oxford)
M. Milosevic (Head of Research Radiation Oncology (PMH), Toronto)
V. Quaranta (Director VICBC)
S. Sivaloganathan (Director, Centre for Math Medicine)
J. Tuszynski (Allard Chair in Experiment. Oncology, Cross
Cancer Inst.)
G. Webb (Mathematics, Vanderbilt)
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Mailing List : To receive
updates on the program please subscribe to our mailing list at www.fields.utoronto.ca/maillist
The thematic programme will be co-ordinated by the Centre for Mathematical
Medicine (CMM) at the Fields Institute, the Vanderbilt Integrative
Cancer Biology Center (VICBC) and the Ontario Institute for Cancer
Research (OICR). In order to create the maximum level of continuity
and coherence as the programme evolves, we propose to have a number
of themes running throughout the 2-month focus period. The scientific
content of each of these themes would be overseen by one of the
members of the organising committee (under guidance from the scientific
advisory committee) but principally by 2-4 specialist programme
participants that include experts in each of the theme areas. The
program would start and end with 2 international workshops encompassing
the overall themes.
Outline of Scientific Activities
Fridays, (11am-1:30pm, starting July 11)
Introduction to Mathematical Oncology
Instructors: M. Kohandel, S. Sivaloganathan
Medical Image Processing
Instructors: C. Drapaca, C. Studholme, H. Zhu.
Workshops and Summer School
There will be two international workshop in each month of the
2-month thematic program. The first of these workshops will scheduled
to take place at the beginning of the program in July, with the
second scheduled towards the end of the program in August.
July 2-4, 2008,
Workshop on Growth and Control
of Tumors: Theory and Experiment
Organizing Committee: M. Kohandel, P. Maini, S. Sivaloganathan,
K. Swanson
August 2-6, 2008
VICBC Summer School on Integrative
Cancer Biology
"Current Challenges in Oncology, through the Mathematical Looking
Glass"
Organizing Committee
(Vanderbilt): A. Anderson, P. Crooke, L. Matrisian, L. Estrada,
G. Webb and V. Quaranta
(Waterloo): M. Kohandel, S. Sivaloganathan
August 25-27, 2008
Workshop on Quantitative Cancer
Modelling: Mathematical Models, Imaging and Bioinformatics
Organizing Committee: Hongmei Zhu, Corina Drapaca, Mike Milosovic,
Siv Sivaloganathan
CMM/VICBC/OICR
Coxeter Lecture Series
August 6-8, 2008
Professor Martin Nowak (Program for Evolutionary Dynamics,
Harvard University) will deliver the Coxeter Lecture Series.
One of these lectures will be accessible to a broad audience (i.e.
basic scientists, clinicians and mathematical scientists) whilst
the other two may be of a more specialized nature related to the
thematic program.
Research Seminars
Visitors will be invited to speak in a weekly research seminar.
There will also be a working seminar, open to all but directed
mainly at the graduate students and postdoctoral fellows in
attendance, providing an opportunity for them to present research
papers and discuss research topics of current interest.
Program Research Themes
1. Mathematical/Quantitative Oncology:
Co-ordinators: M. Kohandel (Waterloo),
P. Maini (Oxford), K.Swanson (Washington)
This will address a broad number of issues in oncology. Amongst
them, the development of models that incorporate the effects of
various processes on drug delivery to tumour sites and that help
identify treatment protocols and regimens that will result in
the most effective drug concentrations and residence time in the
target tissue areas. Another focal point will be the development
of mathematical models linking the effective drug concentration
in tumour cells with molecular targets (in a time and concentration
dependent manner) which are needed to improve our understanding
of drug-target interaction. Another focus area of potentially
enormous practical interest is the modelling and optimisation
of chemotherapy and radiotherapy protocols. Mathematical models
are required to improve understanding of the dynamic interplay
between various processes and to translate these to clinical applications.
Several other areas of focus would include mathematically driven
experimental oncology, evolutionary models of carcinogenesis as
well as organ models (brain, breast, prostate, ovarian, colorectal
cancers). These challenges, as always, will lead to new mathematics
and computational tools and generate new problems. Specific topics
to be addressed during this focus period include:
(1)Integration of multiscale/multilevel data
Core group: P. Maini (Oxford), A. Anderson (Dundee), H. Byrne
(Nottingham), V. Quaranta (Vanderbilt), G. Webb (Vanderbilt)
(2)Multiphase and mechanical aspects of tumour biology
Core group: M. Chaplain (Dundee), H. Byrne (Nottingham), A. Stephanou
(Grenoble), T. Roose (Oxford), L. Preziosi (Torino), Z. Agur (IMBM).
2. Bioinformatics:
Co-ordinators:
M. Li (Waterloo), I. Jurisica (OCI)
The "molecular revolution" of the last two decades,
spurred on particularly from the impetus provided by the genome
projects, has inundated the field with an over abundance of data
but done little to remedy the paucity of relevant mathematical
models and techniques. Recent advances in computational statistics
have heralded the possibility of vast improvements in the quality
of statistical analyses. Coupled with this, the problems in analysing
the flood of molecular genetic sequences and structures has raised
a range of challenging biomathematical topics. These draw on a
variety of sub-branches including stochastic processes, probabilistic
modelling, statistical data analysis, neural networks, genetic
algorithms and expert systems. This theme will encompass several
areas including the analysis of gene expression data, regulatory
networks and computational proteomics as well as other emerging
areas.
Specific topics to be addressed during this focus period include:
1) Protein structure prediction and refinement
Core group: D. Baker (Washington), B. Berger (MIT), M. Li (Waterloo),
J. Skolnick (Georgia Tech), J. Xu (Toyota Institute, Chicago),
Y. Zhang (Kansas), J. Tuszynski (Cross Cancer Inst., Alberta).
2) New algorithms to annotate genes and other functionally
active parts of the genome
Core group: A. Condon (UBC), H. Hoos (UBC), M. Li (Waterloo),
C. Sahinalp (SFU), L. Stacho (SFU), K. Zhang (UWO)
(3) Modelling and analysis in the discovery and characterisation
of genes that influence susceptibility to various cancers
Core group: M. Corey (Toronto), G. Darlington (Guelph), J. Graham
(SFU), C. Greenwood (Toronto),
K. Morgan (McGill), B. Smith (Dalhousie), D. Tritchler (Toronto),
S. Bull (Mt. Sinai).
3. Medical Imaging and Related Treatment
Modalities:
Co-ordinators: C. Drapaca (Penn State), H.M.Zhu (York), M. Milosevic(PMH)
Modern technology coupled with the mathematical sciences holds
the very real promise of providing quantitative imaging information
about structures/phenomena, hithertofore thought to be inaccessible
to imaging. There is also potential to build up information based
on the synthesis and fusion of multiple imaging modalities. Thus
this theme will focus on a number of topics including new computational
techniques and algorithms for 3D imaging as well as inverse problems,
magnetic resonance elastography, tomography, PDES and conformal
maps.
Specific topics to be addressed during this focus period include:
(1) Precision in radiation therapy - accounting for organ/tissue
motion and Computational challenges in radiation
oncology
Core group: K. Brock (PMH), T. Chan (MIT), J. Deasy (Washington,
St. Louis), E. Lee (Georgia Tech), D. Jaffray (PMH), L. Xing (Stanford),
M. Milosevic (PMH)
(2) Determination of the mechanical properties of tumours
and abnormal tissue using magnetic resonance elastography (MRE)
Core group: C. Drapaca (Mayo), I. Sack (Berlin), C. MacGowan (Sick
Kids), A. Samani (UWO), C. Luginbuhl (Sunnybrook &Womens Hosp),
D.B. Plewes (Toronto), A. Manduca (Mayo), E. Van Houten (Dartmouth),
R. Muthupillai (Houston), J. Sciaretta (Toronto)
Affiliated Activities
July 30-August 2, 2008
Society for Mathematical
Biology (SMB) Conference
Hosted by the Centre for Mathematical Medicine (CMM) . This is
one of the premier conferences on mathematics in biology and the
biomedical sciences. This conference will integrate into the activities
of the thematic program with Cancer being one of the major themes
of the conference. This will take place July 30-August 2, 2008
at the University of Toronto.
Apply to the Program:
All scientific events are open to the mathematical sciences community.
Visitors who are interested in office space or funding
are requested to apply by filling out the application
form. Additional support is available (pending NSF funding)
to support junior US visitors to this program. Fields scientific
programs are devoted to research in the mathematical sciences,
and enhanced graduate and post-doctoral training opportunities.
Part of the mandate of the Institute is to broaden and enlarge
the community, and to encourage the participation of women and
members of visible minority groups in our scientific programs.
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