One methodology scientists use to understand these problems is population biology, the study of large groups of people or parasites, primarily through mathematical modeling. And what's becoming more and more apparent is that population biology is going to be very important in helping us understand, in a quantitative manner, what's happening with diseases. Students study the discovery of infectious disease, the effect of disease in human history, the way that vaccinations work and conditions under which diseases will spread or be controlled in populations. Cancer and other diseases are treated as ecological and evolutionary processes.
Students read articles from a collection of original and review literature.
Class material ties in closely with Antia and Levin's current research. Both are interested in the population biology of antibiotic resistance, with Levin working on the population dynamics of bacteria and Antia concentrating on the population dynamics of the immune response. From the perspective of a virus or a bacteria or a protozoa, we're just a meal, basically-just the source of nutrients. By understanding how that evolutionary process works, we believe that we will better understand not only the origin of disease but the control of disease.