Chalmers Conferences, 9th European Conference on Mathematical and Theoretical Biology

Insights into the evolution of drug resistance from simple models
Troy Day

Last modified: 2014-06-09

Abstract




The evolution of drug resistance is one of the most serious public health
problems in modern medicine. In this talk I will present two insights into
the problem that are obtained from relatively simple mathematical models
involving a separation of ecological and evolutionary timescales: (1) contrary
to current orthodoxy, a lighter drug dosage can be most eective for
controlling resistance evolution; and (2) cofactors aimed an manipulating
within-host ecological interactions can prevent the evolution of resistance.
I will also present preliminary data from an experimental test of the latter
idea.