PIMS-SFU CSC Seminar: Klaus Altmann

The approach of Nigel Gay for estimating the coverage of multivalent vaccine (MMR = measles, mumps, rubella) out antibody prevalence data leads to a polynomial system of equations of degree six describing a generically 2:1 covering of the 7-dimensional projective space. This makes it possible to gain an explicit formulae for the vaccine coverage in terms of Cayley's 2x2x2 hyperdeterminant, its derivatives, and the ordinary determinants of the slices of this 3-dimensional matrix. We will explain these notions and the geometric background of this leading to the secant variety of the Segre embedding of P1xP1xP1. This will also shed some light onto the stability questions of Gay's model.