Research Workshop on Mathematical Virology

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Viruses pose a significant threat for the public health sector and new efficient anti-viral treatments are urgently required. Insights in the structures of viruses and the mechanism underlying their formation provide the basis for the development of such therapeutics. Most viruses package their genomic material in a protein container that acts as a Trojan horse, providing protection and transport for the viral genome between hosts. These protein containers are known to be well ordered, and can therefore be understood in terms of the mathematical language of symmetry. In this workshop we explore the mathematical tools necessary to understand the structures of viruses, and then exploit these results to gain insights in how viruses form and how they infect their hosts. An understanding of how these processes depend on the geometries of the protein containers potentially permits the development of novel strategies for inhibiting these processes. These in turn have the potential to result in the development of anti-viral drugs targeted at such stages of the viral life cycle. In this interdisciplinary workshop we are planning to bring together mathematicians with biophysicists, computational and experimental biologists working on various aspects of the structure and assembly of viruses, thus creating an environment that facilitates meaningful interactions for the mathematical community with other relevant disciplines. Such interactions are especially important to ensure the impact of the mathematical modelling in biology. In this workshop we will explore opportunities for mathematical modelling in the areas of virus structure, assembly, genome packaging and, for the first time, also in nanotechnology applications. These focus areas will be represented by keynote talks as well as hot topic debates at the meeting. Earmarked bursaries will encourage young researchers to attend the meeting.