A three-dimensional multi-agent-based model for the evolution of Chagas’ disease

Abstract

A better understanding of Chagas’ disease is important because the knowledge about the progression and the participation of the different types of cells in this disease are still lacking. To clarify this system, the kinetics of inflammatory cells and parasite nests was shown in an experiment. Using this experimental data, we have developed a three-dimensional multi-agent-based computational model for the evolution of Chagas’ disease. Our model includes five different types of agents: inflammatory cell, fibrosis, cardiomyocyte, fibroblast, and Trypanosoma cruzi. Fibrosis is fixed and the other types of agents can move through the empty space. They move randomly by using the Moore neighborhood. This model reproduces the acute and chronic phases of Chagas’ disease and the volume occupied by all different types of cells in the cardiac tissue.