Student Information for Bedford, Virginia

Name: Bedford, Virginia
Homepage: http://people.arsc.edu/~bedford/
Email: vbedford[AT]cmu.edu
Research Keywords: dynamic network analysis, high performance computing, BioWar
Affiliation: CASOS
Research:
Right now I am assessing characteristics and capabilities of a multi-agent computer simulation model related to issues of scaling of agents using BioWar, a city-scale model of disease dispersion. High fidelity multi-agent simulation systems are needed for training and planning in areas such as the spread of infectious disease. However, as the fidelity of the models increases so do the required computational time and storage requirements. Major efficiencies would be achieved if the we could run the model with fewer agents and extrapolate the behavior to larger groups. Such models could be thought of as having scalable results. We examine what types of results are likely to be scalable for epidemiological models by using the BioWar simulation model, a citywide model of epidemiological and chemical events. We examine the spread of influenza in Norfolk, Virginia. We consider peak size and day of infection, shape of infection curves, and effects of scale on subpopulation age-groups to discover whether increasing granularity increases fidelity and whether there are certain thresholds beyond which increasing the granularity does not yield substantial gains in fidelity.

Publications:

Lee, Bruce Y & Bedford, Virginia & Roberts, Mark S & Carley, Kathleen M . (2008). Virtual Epidemic in a virtual city simulating the spread of influenza in a U.S. metropolitan area. Forthcoming, []

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Ph.D. Program in Computation, Organizations and Society
School of Computer Science
Carnegie Mellon University
5000 Forbes Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15213
(412)268-3163
cos-phd@cs.cmu.edu