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<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Aptos",sans-serif"><img width="600" height="171" style="width:6.25in;height:1.7812in" id="Picture_x0020_2" src="cid:image001.png@01DBAD47.9FFAD220" alt="Thesis Defense Announcement at the Cullen College of Engineering"></span><span style="font-family:"Aptos",sans-serif;mso-ligatures:none"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<b><span style="font-size:18.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:#C8102E">Digital Twin of Glucose Metabolism of Type 1 Diabetes Patients</span></b><b><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black;mso-ligatures:none"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
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<b><span style="font-size:13.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black;mso-ligatures:none">Onyinyechi Ihesiulo</span></b><b><span style="font-size:13.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;mso-ligatures:none"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
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<span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black;mso-ligatures:none">April 25, 2025, 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. (CST)<br>
Location: Engineering Bldg. 1, Small Conference Room or </span><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Aptos",sans-serif;color:black"><a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-join/19*3ameeting_MjdhOGY5ZTMtYTVlMS00MmI4LTkwNzQtY2NlMzUzN2RlOWUx*40thread.v2/0?context=*7b*22Tid*22*3a*22170bbabd-a2f0-4c90-ad4b-0e8f0f0c4259*22*2c*22Oid*22*3a*22f23897f8-9c83-4b3a-9670-72db9e1a2487*22*7d__;JSUlJSUlJSUlJSUlJSUl!!LkSTlj0I!C-dZQzfMMXj7PgkgDoqw0Ie5g9xui2Kf9dCHO6DW7MhVyq3ey4kxXywOva3J5GySdCdPUcz3an-zfwlpxK_iZMWUJN0$"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:#467886;mso-ligatures:none">Teams
Link</span></a></span><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Aptos",sans-serif;mso-ligatures:none"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black;mso-ligatures:none">Meeting ID: 288 044 602 529 4</span><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Aptos",sans-serif;mso-ligatures:none"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black;mso-ligatures:none">Passcode: xr64gz3X</span><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Aptos",sans-serif;mso-ligatures:none"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<b><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black;mso-ligatures:none"><o:p> </o:p></span></b></p>
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<b><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black;mso-ligatures:none">Committee Chair:</span></b><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black;mso-ligatures:none"><br>
Marzia Cescon, Ph.D. </span><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Aptos",sans-serif;mso-ligatures:none"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<b><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black;mso-ligatures:none">Committee Members:</span></b><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black;mso-ligatures:none"><br>
Luca Pollonini, Ph.D. | Sandeep Gupta, Ph.D</span><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Aptos",sans-serif;mso-ligatures:none"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto"><b><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:#C8102E;mso-ligatures:none">Abstract</span></b><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:#C8102E;mso-ligatures:none"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:106%;background:white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;line-height:106%;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black;border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in">Digital twins (DTs) present an exciting potential in personalized
therapy through the provision of in silico simulations of a patient's responses to treatments. This study introduces a novel blood glucose prediction and simulation framework that has been tailored to simulate the dynamics of individual glucose-insulin responses
in people with Type 1 Diabetes (T1D) which can be exploited for the design, testing and regulatory approval of robust, precise, safe and effective novel insulin therapeutic regimes without the need of</span><span style="font-size:10.5pt;line-height:106%;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black">any
interventions on the individuals. </span><span style="color:black"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<span style="font-size:10.5pt;line-height:106%;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black">Our framework hinges on a model of glucose dynamics and a method for physiological parameter estimation which utilizes a Liquid Time-Constant Neural Network (LTCNN).
The developed DT was trained and validated on synthetic data obtained from an established metabolic model of T1D dynamics, which provided a controlled environment consisting of 10 virtual subjects for evaluating the DT's prediction performance. We compared
the LTCNN with Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) for the estimation of unknown parameters in the model, exploiting a method recently proposed in the literature.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<span style="font-size:10.5pt;line-height:106%;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
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<span style="font-size:10.5pt;line-height:106%;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black"> The MCMC-based DT prioritizes interpretable, physiology-driven parameter identification, whereas the LTCNN-based variation emphasizes data-driven dynamics modeling with
real-time responsiveness. Both techniques were tested on five predefined in silico scenarios, and accuracy was measured using metrics such as MARD and RMSE.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<span style="font-size:10.5pt;line-height:106%;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<span style="font-size:10.5pt;line-height:106%;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black">According to the results, our DT is capable of accurately capturing the glucose behavior of an individual in the presence of variable insulin and meal inputs. The MCMC
variation gives mechanical interpretability, whereas the LTCNN model provides fast inference and adaptable learning. This study contributes to the larger field of DT technology in diabetes management by highlighting the trade-offs between statistical inference
and neuronal modeling in physiological systems.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
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