Pathogen mutation modeled by competition between site and bond percolation

Phys Rev Lett. 2013 Mar 8;110(10):108103. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.110.108103. Epub 2013 Mar 5.

Abstract

While disease propagation is a main focus of network science, its coevolution with treatment has yet to be studied in this framework. We present a mean-field and stochastic analysis of an epidemic model with antiviral administration and resistance development. We show how this model maps to a coevolutive competition between site and bond percolation featuring hysteresis and both second- and first-order phase transitions. The latter, whose existence on networks is a long-standing question, imply that a microscopic change in infection rate can lead to macroscopic jumps in expected epidemic size.

Publication types

  • Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.

MeSH terms

  • Communicable Diseases / epidemiology*
  • Communicable Diseases / microbiology*
  • Communicable Diseases / therapy
  • Disease Outbreaks
  • Disease Transmission, Infectious
  • Epidemiologic Methods
  • Models, Genetic*
  • Molecular Epidemiology
  • Mutation*
  • Stochastic Processes