nr. 477 - 2011 - Institut for Natur, Systemer og Modeller (NSM)

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Preface
This thesis took its beginning when Professor Johnny Ottesen introduced me to a number
of articles all of which used mathematical modelling to look at diabetes. Amongst
the articles I found that an article called “Onset of Type 1 Diabetes - A Dynamical
Instability” (Blasio et al. (1999)) was the most interesting. At the same time Lars
Hervig Jacobsen was looking to pick a subject for his bachelor thesis.
We got into contact with Professor, Dr. MD, Flemming Pociot, to discuss the aforementioned
article, of which he is a coauthor, along with an article by Marée et al. (2006)
called “Modelling the onset of Type 1 diabetes: can impaired macrophage phagocytosis
make the difference between health and disease?” which we had found while searching
for literature. The article by Marée et al. (2006) is a revised and expanded version of
the model presented in Blasio et al. (1999). They modify the model from Blasio et al.
(1999) to investigate another hypothesis than Blasio et al. (1999), but they also state
that the model in Blasio et al. (1999) becomes physiologically unviable when estimated
or experimentally obtained parameters are inserted in the model.
We decided to gain insight into the writings of Marée et al. (2006) to see if they were
correct in their assertions and to see if the revised model was a good foundation from
which we formulate our own model.
Acknowledgements
This thesis would not have existed in the form it is in today had it not been for a
number of people. I would like to thank:
First of all my supervisor Professor Johnny T. Ottesen for all of his help with matlab,
mathematical modelling, discussions about bifurcation diagrams, suggestions, his
meticulous corrections, general inspiring interest and for establishing connection to the
next person to whom I would like to extent my gratitude: Chief physician at Steno
Diabetes Center Dr. MD. Flemming Pociot who was my external supervisor for the
duration of my work.
At the outset of this thesis I knew as much about molecular biology as the common
walrus knows about accounting, but thanks to Dr. Pociot’s willingness to meet with
Lars Hervig Jacobsen and I, to discuss articles and answer questions of varying depth
the language of biology soon became familiar. B.Sc. Lars Hervig Jacobsen who defied
nature and weird looks from people in the computer lab at imfufa, Roskilde University,
to be able to work 24-7 on his bachelors thesis. I collaborated with him during the first
half of the thesis. It made the process much more enjoyable and without him a lot of
the matlab-based results might not have existed in the form they are in today.
Approximately halfway through the process I was in the good fortune of receiving a
grant from Mærsk. The grant was intended to allow one to go abroad for a semester,
and thanks to the kindness of Dr. Tom Archibald and the mathematics department
at the Simon Fraser University (SFU) in Vancouver, Canada, I was able to spend the
fall-semester at SFU. This provided me with the privilege of having a meeting with Dr.
Diane T. Finegood at her office on campus at SFU. There I was given the opportunity
to discuss subjects from the article of Marée et al. (2006), which she coauthored, and
ask questions of relevance in general. Dr. Finegood referred me to Dr. MD Bruce
Vercherer of University of British Columbia (UBC), who provided me with answers to