Sample computational structures towards an epidemic simulation tool comprising communicating programs on mobile phones and servers

Possible computational structures are explored for an epidemic simulation tool comprising communicating programs on mobile phones and server(s). Through calculations distributed among devices, such a tool or computational structure could in approximately real-time access and directly longitudinally incorporate location or distance information of individual mobile devices into an individual-level epidemiological model in order to collect simulated epidemic data; multiple epidemic simulations could be run simultaneously with various simulated control measures. Initial program phases are built towards the tool: (1) a sample individual-level model is built similar in structure but not rigor to what is found in the research literature; (2) an epidemic simulation tool is simulated being used in a simulated world; (3) a sample abstract demonstration (demo) is built of the computational structure for the tool. The demo comprises running simultaneously from one computer multiple communicating processes, one process for each mobile device and one for a server, mobile device detection of synthetic location information in time (fast-forwarded for the demo) for location-based interaction inference, and for each mobile device a set of multiple sim-humans for the multiple epidemic simulations. Sample epidemic simulation outputs from these phases show what information each mobile device can see about its sim-humans and what epidemic simulation data is assembled by the server. If fully developed including flexibility for models and statistics, such a research tool may complement other forms of information or data use for epidemiological models. These initial phases provide a concrete illustration to consider the tool’s central aspects and possible structures. Possibilities are explored for a tool on mobile phones and servers which simulates epidemics using location or distance information. The basic model, a simulated world using such a tool, and an abstract demonstration of the tool concretely illustrate its central aspects. A longterm goal would be to fully flexibly develop a tool so that it may complement other forms of information use for epidemiological models.