Modeling the spatiotemporal dynamics of virotherapy and immune response as a treatment for cancer

Abstract

Oncolytic virotherapy is a promising treatment for cancer, which uses viruses that selectively target and kill cancer cells. In this article, we developed a system of partial differential equations, which describes the spatiotemporal dynamics of cancer cells under virotherapy and immune response. We carried out numerical simulations of the system and analyzed the important biological parameters. The numerical results suggest that high viral infection plays an important role in improving the treatment outcomes. Moreover, strong immune response can improve the result of virotherapy along with a high immune killing rate of cancer cells. This model could be validated by using patients’ data; and thus it may help oncologists choose the optimal therapy to eradicate cancer.