IMC Colloquium Series: "GeoSimulation Approach for Modeling Human Disease Dynamics"
11:30 - 12:30
Rm10900
Dr. Suzana Dragićević
Department of Geography, SFU
Abstract
Human infectious diseases are emerging with increasing frequency and intensity. Some examples are recent outbreaks of H1N1 influenza, severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), measles, vector-borne malaria, avian flu or legionnaire's disease among others. These diseases impose serious concerns for public health professionals. The evolution of human infectious disease outbreaks depends on many factors such as population, their movements and interactions, transportation, water quality and availability, climate and land-use/land-cover change. The relationship among factors is often complex making it difficult to predict, localize and control the disease spread. Complex system theory and its application within a geospatial and temporal context provide an effective means to address and model some of these infectious diseases. A geosimulation approach for modeling the dynamics of a human infectious disease spread in an urban environment will be presented as a pilot study developed within the Spatial Analysis and Modeling (SAM) Lab of the Geography Department, SFU.
About the Speaker
Dr. Suzana Dragievi is a Professor at the Department of Geography and director of the Spatial Analysis and Modeling (SAM) Research Laboratory at SFU. Her research program is related to the integration of complexity theory, geographic information systems (GIS) and soft computing for multi-scale spatial modeling and decision-making. Applications areas include land-use/land-cover change, urban growth, geography, forestry, landscape ecology and epidemiology. She has published over 60 peer-reviewed papers and book chapters, conference papers, book reviews and a co-edited book. Dr. Dragievi has served on many local and international conference program committees, is a co-editor of the Springer book series on ``Advances in Geographic Information Science"; editor for GIScience, The Canadian Geographer journal; associate editor for Modeling and Decisions Support Systems, Geomatica journal; and a member of the editorial boards for several international journals.
