Challenge
Dr. Emmanuel Bakare, a scientist, teacher and the leader of Laboratory of Modelling Infectious Diseases and Applied Sciences (LOMIDAS), was searching for a tool powerful enough to support his research, developing mathematical simulation models to study trends in infectious diseases.
Solution
Bakare adopted Maple due to its combination of power and user-friendly tools. It allows him to carry out large-scale simulations and calculate large systems of equations, facilitating more efficient data analysis.
Result
Maple has been vital to Bakare’s ground-breaking research. It allows him to work through complex problems and data in a timely manner, while still producing accurate results. Bakare recently used Maple in a study examining how the human body develops immunity to disease.
While many look at mathematics simply as a subject one takes in school, the truth is that mathematics is the foundation for many aspects of our lives. A diverse range of professional fields – including defence, aerospace, manufacturing, automobile and even athletic equipment development - rely on mathematics to drive innovation, gather data, model performance and improve technology. It even spurs developments in the medical field, where researchers use mathematical models and data to better understand the human body and its response to various afflictions. Dr. Emmanuel Bakare, a Nigerian scientist, researcher and educator, utilizes Maple to examine patterns in infectious diseases and further understand their effects on the body.
The leader of a group called Laboratory of Modelling in Infectious Diseases and Applied Sciences (LOMIDAS), Bakare is a mathematical modeller who uses simulation models to provide insights into infectious disease trends, quantify likely benefits of public health interventions, and support risk assessment for emerging infectious diseases. His experience includes work with compartmental models, stochastic simulations, differential equations, agent-based models, time series analysis, wavelet analysis, spatial dynamics, infectious diseases control, and models parameters estimation.
In addition to using Maple in his research, Dr. Emmanuel Bakare trains his undergraduate students to use Maple to support their modelling projects
While attending a workshop at the University of Cape Coast in Ghana, Bakare was introduced to Maple by some of his colleagues. Maple greatly simplifies life for modellers like him. “I find it easy to use Maple to do analysis of my disease models, and using the software has really been a wonderful experience,” Bakare said. “Maple has been helpful in tackling very difficult mathematical problems. It can do things that other math software is just not able to do. Maple has been very useful for my work and research.”
Bakare’s research is based on developing an understanding of infectious disease transmission through analysis of incidences and data from surveillance systems. He regularly explores a number of forms of data visualization and time series analysis in order to identify meaningful signals in the data. He develops mathematical and computational models of disease transmission, fits them to real data and compares different modelling techniques as a function of the type of data and the kind of question under investigation. “I use models to test different hypotheses regarding transmission mechanisms, to estimate key epidemiological parameters such as Reproduction Number, and to explore optimal interventions to reduce disease incidence,” he said. “Maple is helpful to this end as it can successfully handle large systems of equations and large-scale simulations.”
In a recent study, Bakare examined how the human body develops immunity to various diseases. Using Maple, he conducted an equilibrium analysis using a mathematical model first developed by renowned scientists Roy M. Anderson and Robert M. May. The model shows how the presence of virus cells stimulates the body to produce lymphocytes that attack and kill the virus cells. “With Maple, you aren’t forced to choose between mathematical power and usability, making it the ideal tool for research and for working with models like this,” he said. “Maple’s powerful math engine allows me to analyze and solve mathematical problems that are critical to my work.”
Maple has many features that appeal to Bakare in his work, specifically Maple’s ability to handle complex mathematical modelling problems. His work with Maple has allowed him to find the equilibrium solution of several non-linear systems of differential equations in mathematical modelling of infectious diseases. He has also been able to solve and build iterations of other non-linear systems of equations using the Homotopy Analysis method. “The tasks Maple enables me to perform are invaluable,” Bakare said.
In addition to his research, Bakare trains his undergraduate students to use Maple to support their undergraduate modelling projects. “Maple can handle many different types of problems in a short time,” he said. “I have many projects planned with Maple. It is software everyone should have.”
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