A Mechanistic, Stochastic Model Helps Understand Multiple Sclerosis Course and Pathogenesis
Figure 5
Potential (double-well) as a function of the state variable . The potential associated with the mechanistic model described by (1) is plotted for two values of the parameter controlling the height of the wells: (a) = 1 and (b) = 0.7. The variable represents the health state of a patient (i.e., the position of the particle in our metaphor). The health state is denoted by , the no health state by , and is the unstable steady state between them. is the barrier whose height is controlled by the parameter . Dashed lines denote the upper and lower bounds of the potential barrier.
