Mixing patterns between age groups in social networks

We present a method for estimating transmission matrices that describe the mixing and the probability of infection between age groups. Transmission matrices can be used to estimate age-dependent forces of infection in age-structured, compartmental models for the study of infectious diseases. We have analyzed the social network generated by bipartite graphs for the synthetic city of Portland and identified mixing patterns. Our results show that children interact most frequently with other children close to their own age, while adults interact with a wider range of age groups and the durations of typical adult contacts are shorter than typical contacts between children. Corresponding author:Tel.:+1-505-665-7285; fax:+1-505-665-7464. E-mail: [email protected]. Present address: Virginia Bioinformatics Institute, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA 24061, USA 1