BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:-//Talks.cam//talks.cam.ac.uk//
X-WR-CALNAME:Talks.cam
BEGIN:VEVENT
SUMMARY:The Scaling Laws of Human Travel – New Approaches to the Forecas
 t of Epidemics - Theo Geisel\,  Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self
 -Organization\, Gottingen\, Germany\n
DTSTART:20070813T150000Z
DTEND:20070813T154500Z
UID:TALK7795@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Nick Watkins
DESCRIPTION:Many infectious diseases are transmitted from person to person
  and human travel is responsible for their geographical spread. In order t
 o model\, forecast\, and control the spread of epidemics\, one needs to kn
 ow the statistical mechanics of human travel. How can we obtain reliable i
 nformation on travelling statistics\, if people can travel using very di
 fferent means of transportation from bikes to planes? We have studied thi
 s problem empirically and theoretically using the dispersal of dollar bill
 s as a proxy. The time dependent probability density obtained in this way 
 exhibits pronounced spatiotemporal scaling and anomalous diffusion\, whic
 h mathematically can be described very accurately in terms of a bifraction
 al diffusion equation with few parameters.  *work in collaboration with D
 . Brockmann and L. Hufnagel\n\nReferences:\n\n[1] D. Brockmann\, L. Hufnag
 el\, and T. Geisel\, “The scaling laws of human travel”\, Nature 439\,
  462 (2006).\n\n[2] L. Hufnagel\, D. Brockmann\, and T. Geisel\, “Foreca
 st and control of epidemics in a globalized world”\, PNAS\, 101\, 15124 
 (2004).\n
LOCATION:Law Faculty\, Cambridge
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR