The development of computational models of biological tissues and systems has been one of the central research fields within the Unit of Medical Technology and Intelligent Information Systems. Modelling extends from hard tissues (bones) to simulate ultrasound propagation in healing bone, soft tissues (arteries) to study the development of plaque to biological systems, such as metabolic models for glucose control and prediction.

Bone fracture healing is a complex regenerative process that in most cases is successfully completed within several months. However, a significant percentage of the fracture cases is associated with healing implications. In daily practice, evaluation of fracture healing is performed by serial clinical and radiographic examinations, both of which depend on the orthopaedic surgeon’s expertise and clinical judgment. The objective of our research is to investigate the use of ultrasound waves on monitoring the healing process and early detecting healing complications using both in vitro experiments and computational models.
(more details…)

Atherosclerosis, a disease of the large arteries, is the primary cause of heart disease and stroke. In westernized societies, it is underlying cause of about 50% of all deaths. Atherosclerosis is a multi - factorial process, which requires extensive accumulation of smooth muscle cells within the intima of the affected artery. The objective of our research is to develop and validate a model for the mass transfer from the blood flow to the artery wall based on blood flow, arterial wall mechanics, biological factors and gene expression which indicates the region of the development and the growth rate of the atherosclerotic plaque progress.
(more details…)

Modelling of human glucose metabolism in patients suffering from Diabetes Mellitus is an attractive research topic. Our aim is to develop dynamic models of the metabolic behaviour of insulin-treated diabetic patients (either type-1 or type 2) to predict the influence of specific parameters on glucose level and provide decision support to both the patient and the treating physician.
(more details…)

Tissue and Cell mark-up languages are based on open standards like the XML markup language. Known Cell scale ML languages are CellML and SBML. The purpose of using Mark-up languages is to store and exchange computer-based mathematical models. It allows scientists to share models even if they are using different model-building software. It also enables them to reuse components from one model in another, thus accelerating model building. This level of modelling includes information about model structure (how the parts of a model are organizationally related to one another), mathematics (equations describing the underlying processes) and metadata (additional information about the model that allows scientists to search for specific models or model components in a database or other repository). Both CellML and SBML includes mathematics and metadata by leveraging existing languages, including MathML and RDF. In our laboratory we work on extending these mark-up languages in order to specify data and define simulation and rendering information.
(more details…)