Speakers
Description
We propose a minisymposium highlighting recent advances in mathematical and computational modeling of the immune response to therapy in the context of chronic diseases. Disease-associated chronic antigen exposure induces an immune response characterized by sustained activation followed by progressive functional decline of immune cells. Therapeutic interventions must therefore overcome not only pathological persistence but also a dysregulated immune environment marked by reduced effector function, impaired cytokine secretion, and expanded regulatory or suppressive gene expression.
The complexity of this problem makes chronic disease an ideal context for mechanistic and data-driven modeling approaches aimed at exploring and optimizing treatment strategies. The four speakers in our proposed single 80-minute session will present mathematical models built from principles of quantitative systems pharmacology, omics, and systems biology to interrogate the tightly coupled processes that dictate immune dysfunction, treatment efficacy, and disease fate. Topics of discussion will include immune cell activation and exhaustion dynamics, treatment strategies and predictors of outcome, and disease resistance. Additionally, our minisymposium will highlight different modeling strategies employed in computational immunology, including the application of QSP models and hybrid agent-based models.
