CovidSim

Modeling and simulation of covid infection spread in crowds in system-relevant infrastructures

Prof. Dr. Gerta Köster
Department of Computer Science and Mathematics, 07

The Corona pandemic is on everyone's mind in our everyday life. Simulations of infection spread can help to better understand infection events and also to find appropriate measures and assess their effectiveness. So far, mainly macroscopic models of infection spread are used, which represent the exponential growth of the pandemic.

In the CovidSim project, computer scientists at Munich University of Applied Sciences are looking at what happens locally. In HM's open simulation framework - Vadere - they add local infection spread to an agent-based model for pedestrian movement. For the process of infection, they draw on recognized "SIR" models that observe three states: susceptible, infectious, and recovered / removed due to immunity or death. Only the first two categories matter for the question of how infectious a subway ride is.

The combination of movement of the agents with different hypotheses about contagion allows to analyze if and how the virus can spread e.g., at a train station. Distance and duration of exposure but also different viral loads - with and without a mask - are parameters in the project's lead scenario: the local infection spread through distribution of aerosols with viral particles by a highly infectious passenger moving through a topography. How long are nearby pedestrians exposed to the virus? How likely are they to become infected?

What is the impact of measures such as social distancing, which can rarely be ideally adhered, to in the flow of movement? HM collaborates in CovidSim with psychologists from the consulting agency Team HF to capture human behavior in the Corona pandemic. The engineering firm accu:rate, which uses HM algorithms for its people flow simulations, will identify the acute needs of transportation infrastructure operators and apply the HM-researched models to an entire train station.

The goal of CovidSim is to develop a tool to test hypotheses about the infection process. The tool developed in the project will be made publicly available through the Vadere platform: www.vadere.org .

Running duration:
01.01.2021 – 31.12.2021

Funded by:
Federal Ministry of Education and Research

Project executing organization:
VDI Technologiezentrum GmbH, Düsseldorf

Subcontractors:
accu:rate, Team HF