With the recent alert of a so-called severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) virus, called Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS – CoV), which up to present has unknown origins and has a staggering 47.6% mortality rate, I began to wonder about the complexity of outbreaks and the mathematics behind outbreaks. That's when the research led me to realize that it was possible to model epidemics computationally. As a pathofobiac, I have always been intrigued and frightened by diseases - I am constantly reading the statistics about different diseases, looking at how they are spread, and calculating the chances that one of them will infect me or infects one of my loved ones. So when the opportunity arose to do some mathematical exploration, I thought it would be interesting to examine the mathematics behind the spread of disease. The purpose of this exploration is to study and review an epidemic model, then attempt to apply it to a scenario and determine whether it is a realistic and accurate model.The initial modelAlthough modeling epidemic depends on a variety of factors, which will be discussed later (such as the type of disease and its rate of spread), the initial model takes into account the main factors to produce a simplistic model. First, the initial model takes into account the very basic assumptions listed below. »1. SIR: All individuals fall into one of the following categories: Susceptible: those who can catch the disease. Infectious: those that can spread disease. Suppressed: those who are immune and cannot spread the disease2. The population is numerous, confined to a well-defined region. You might imagine the population to be that of a large university during the semester, when outside travel is relatively limited.3. The population...... middle of paper ......University of Iowa cult)Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS). September 3, 2013. September 3, 2013. Columbia University Department of Statistics. Introduction to epidemic modeling. Unknown Unknown Unknown. August 28, 2013. KidsHealth. Varicella. Unknown Unknown Unknown. September 1, 2013. World Maps. Population Mexico (Poblacion de Mexico]). Unknown Unknown Unknown. September 2, 2013. University of Iowa School of Mathematics. Using calculus to model epidemics. Unknown Unknown Unknown. August 24 2013 .