In may 2020, during the first months of lockdown in Denmark due to the COVID-19 pandemic, I became scientific assistant at RUC, under Viggo Andreasen and Lone Simonsen. By November 2020, I became a PhD student under Viggo Andreasen to investigate "The impact of heterogeneity on the transmission dynamics of epidemic diseases" in the research group PandemiX at RUC. I have as well as studying this very broad subject, also assisted and participating in writing reports to SSI for further assessment, as a part of the PandemiX group. Some of these reports can be seen under my publications
One of my investigations regarding heterogeneity in infectious diseases are disease dynamics on random graphs and structured networks. This is of particular interest due to the fact, that the transition between SIR-type models and pair-formation models to social structures of more complex designs, such as random graphs with additional structures such as e.g. clustering, are generally not very well understood. Furthermore, the interplay between inhomogeneities in social structures and inhomogeneities in the biological factors of disease transmission, such as infectivity and recovery rates, are not perfectly understood as well, although some progress on this front has recently been done by some very smart people from PandemiX.
Some aspects of disease dynamics on structured networks are well understood analytically, like are quite well understood, while the dynamics over longer timescales might not be. For such problems, simulations are another strategy to achieve results, although one is not ensured new insights by employing this strategy. Simulations of large populations can pose challenges, due to the associated complexity, but are very useful for statistical purposes.