[Zurück]

F. Miksch, C. Haim, G. Schneckenreither, F. Breitenecker:
"Comparison of Differential Equations and Cellular Automata for Epidemic Simulation";
in: "ERK - International Electrotechnical and Computer Science Conference", Andrej Zemva (Hrg.); herausgegeben von: University of Ljubljana; ERK - International Electrotechnical and Computer Science Conference, Portoroz, 2013, S. 137 - 140.

Running through the modeling process, the choice of an
appropriate modeling technique is one of the first and
most fundamental questions. This crucial point might be
responsible for success or failure. The right choice is
almost never unique and depends strongly on the
questions one wants to answer. This paper compares
two modeling techniques coming from completely
different point of views: ordinary differential equations
and cellular automata. For comparison a simple
epidemic spread is modeled and simulated with the two
approaches and the results are investigated on both an
experimental and analytical level. The idea is defining
an underlying system that has to be modeled. This
allows a standardized model parameterization and
comparable representation of the results. It turns out
that for many settings both models behave similarly and
can be considered as describing the same system
correctly. After reading this paper, one should be aware
of the differences and similarities of both techniques
especially when applied on epidemic spread and should
know about the different model properties.
1 Introduction
This paper should carve out the connections and
differences of two modelling techniques for simulation
of infectious disease propagation. For this aim a welldefined
system is given which has to be simulated using
differential equations and a cellular automaton [1]. The
system describes a simple SIR-type epidemic, based on
the ideas of Kermack and McKendrick [2]. The idea is
to simulate the system with both approaches to find out
differences and similarities.

http://publik.tuwien.ac.at/files/PubDat_224190.pdf