• Project led by Verónica Anaya Domínguez (UBB) aims to develop numerical methods for mathematical models that describe the electrical activity of the heart. 

A few days ago, the resolution that accounts for the award of financing to the projects applying to the scientific cooperation program in force between the Committee for the Evaluation and Orientation of Scientific Cooperation with Chile of the Government of France, and the National Agency of Research and Development of the Ministry of Science, Technology, Knowledge and Innovation of Chile, ECOS-ANID, was announced. 

One of the selected proposals is the Virtual Element Methods for Different Bidomain Models for Cardiac Electrophysiology (ECOS200038) project, led by the academician of the Research Group on Numerical Methods and Applications, GIMNAP, of the Department of Mathematics of the Universidad del Bío-Bío, UBB, Dr. Verónica Anaya Domínguez, Mathematical Engineer from the Universidad Mayor de San Simón (Bolivia, 2004) and PhD in Applied Sciences with a minor in Mathematical Engineering from UdeC (2011), who is also an external associate researcher at the Center for Research in Mathematical Engineering, CI²MA, of the Universidad de Concepción, UdeC. 

“This is excellent news for our center, since this type of project further strengthens the international cooperation that our researchers maintain. My congratulations to Dr. Anaya. and to her team for this important achievement”, Dr. Rodolfo Araya Durán, Director of CI²MA commented. 

In the development of the project, Verónica Anaya will collaborate with the researchers of the CARMEN - INRIA Bordeaux Sud Ouest team (Bordeaux, France), Mostafa Bendahmane (foreign responsible researcher) and Yves Coudière; in addition to Mazen Saad from the Ecole Centrale de Nantes (France), Noureddine Igbida from the Université de Limoges (France), and David Mora, who, as Anaya, is a researcher at CI²MA and academic at GIMNAP - DMAT at UBB. 

“During research stays that I carried out at the Université de Bordeaux with Professor Mostafa Bendamane, I had the opportunity to interact with members of the CARMEN-INRIA Group, a research group specialized in mathematical models and numerical methods to simulate the propagation of cardiac action potentials”, the researcher explains. 

“In this way”, she continues, “based on a work that we have together with David Mora, Mostafa Bendahmane and Mauricio Sepúlveda (UdeC, CI²MA), the interest arises to continue studying these models, and especially to develop new numerical methods based on virtual elements to understand the behavior of some cardiac electrical pathologies”, she explains about the motivation to study this scientific problem.  

Regarding the importance of international collaboration in the development of frontier science, Dr. Anaya explains that this three-year project considers exchange actions for postgraduate students. “The award of this project will allow the scientific exchange of researchers from France and Chile, as well as PhD and Master students. “It is quite relevant to have this type of funding to be able to carry out research stays and, in this way, exchange opinions with experts, learn about the reality of other research teams, something that enriches us a lot as researchers and even more so our graduate students. This initiative will make it possible to start new collaboration networks and strengthen existing ones for both teachers and students involved”, she details.