Plenary Lecture
Particle Methods Applied in Biology and Chemistry
Professor Franck Assous
Ariel University Center & Bar-Ilan University
ISRAEL
E-mail: franckassous@netscape.net
Abstract: Particle method is a well-known approach that has been used
for a long time in charged particle beams or plasma physics modeling. In
recent years, particle based methods have become widespread tools for
approximating solutions of ordinary/partial differential equations in a
variety of fields. In these methods, a solution of a given equation is
represented by a finite set of particles, located in points xi and carrying
masses ωi. Equations of evolution in time are then written to describe the
dynamics of the location of the particles and their weights. The aim of this
lecture is to show that this method can provide a useful tool of simulation
in biology and chemistry. In the first part, we recall the principles and
the basic properties of the particle method. Numerical and algorithm
considerations are also exposed. In the second part, examples of
reformulation of problems from other fields, like chemistry and biology,
which allow the use of particle based modeling, are presented.
Brief
Biography of the Speaker:
Professor Franck Assous received a Ph.D.
degree in Applied Mathematics from the University of Paris (France). He then
received the French "Habilitation a Diriger les Recherches" degree from the
University of Toulouse (France). He worked more than 14 years at the Atomic
French Agency (CEA) as a senior researcher. In parallel, he was teaching at
the ENSTA School of Engineers (Paris) as an Assitant Professor, then at the
Versailles University as an Associate Professor. He is currently working in
Israel, where he is Professor of Applied Mathematics at the Ariel University
Center (Israel), and at the Bar-Ilan University (Israel). His research
project include numerical methods for Partial Differential Equations, with a
particular interest for problems arising from models in the field of
computational electromagnetism and plasma physics, originated from the need
to compute precisely the motion of charged particles for plasma physics
applications. He is also interested in studying the relations between
different fields (cross-disciplinary research), particularly applications of
mathematical and numerical methods applied to physics, chemistry and
biology.
