數學系演講公告
主 講 人：陳主智 副研究員 (國家衛生研究院 群體健康科學研究所-生物統計與生物資訊研究組) 
講    題：Consumption of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) infected beef and the variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease incident in the U.K.
日    期：100年05月24日（星期二）下午2:30 – 3:20
地    點：數學系(科學館S433室)
摘    要：
The most likely cause of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) is dietary 
exposure to the agent responsible for bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) 
during the epidemic period as early as 1980 in the U.K. The disease occurs when 
sufficient particles of an abnormal protease-resistant isoform (PrPres) 
accumulate within the brain and slowly convert the existing cellular PrPsen 
into abnormal PrPres, resulting in the appearance of the classical symptoms of 
spongiform encephalopathies. This biological mechanism suggests a growth model 
of the abnormal prion PrPres in the brain, and thus a plausible dose-response 
relationship between the exposure to PrPres and the incubation period. Assuming 
the number of times an individual haphazardly consumed beef from an 
unidentified BSE case(s) follows a Poisson process, together with the expected 
amount of abnormal prions from oral intake, we calculated the mean aggregation 
of abnormal prions in brain over the time course. Using this quantity, we 
accomplished the risk assessment report of beef consumption from the U.S. 
requested by the Department of Health. Because the key parameters need to be 
obtained from the vCJD incidents, we also used the BSE epidemic data to 
estimate the vCJD prevalence in the U.K. The results showed that the estimates 
conformed well to the observed vCJD incidents (as of May 2nd, 2011 there were 
175 confirmed or probable vCJD cases in the U.K.).

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