A predictor–corrector approach to investigate and predict the dynamic of cytokine levels and human immune cell activation to Staphylococcus Aureus

Abstract

This paper develops a second-order explicit predictor–corrector numerical approach for solving a mathematical model on the dynamics of cytokine expressions and human immune cell activation in response to the bacterium staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus). The proposed algorithm is at least zero-stable and second-order accurate. Mathematical modeling works that analyze the human body in response to some antigens have predicted concentrations of a broad range of cells and cytokines. This study deals with a coupled cellular-cytokine model which predicts cytokine expressions in response to gram-positive bacteria S. aureus. Tumor necrosis factor alpha, interleukin 6, interleukin 8 and interleukin 10 are included to assess the relationship between cytokine release from macrophages and the concentration of the S. aureus antigen. Ordinary differential equations are used to model cytokine levels while the cellular responses are modeled by partial differential equations. Interactions between both components provide a more robust and complete systems of immune activation. In the numerical simulations, a low concentration of S. aureus is used to measure cellular activation and cytokine expressions. Numerical experiments indicate how the human immune system responds to infections from different pathogens. Furthermore, numerical examples suggest that the new technique is faster and more efficient than a large class of statistical and numerical schemes discussed in the literature for systems of nonlinear equations and can serve as a robust tool for the integration of general systems of initial-boundary value problems.