USING GRID COMPUTING TO MODEL BIOSENSORS ACTING IN STIRRED AND NON-STIRRED SOLUTIONS

Abstract. In this paper the response of the biosensor based on a chemically modified electrode is modeled numerically by using grid computing. Computer models intended to investigate characteristics of biosensors are commonly parameterized. In most cases the same problem is to be manifold solved at different sets of parameter values. Running multiple simulations is a time-consuming task, which can be accelerated by using the grid computing. Biochemical behavior of the biosensor based on a chemically modified electrode 1 was investigated. The mathematical model of the biosensor is based on a system of non-linear reaction-diffusion equations. The Crank–Nicolson finite difference method has been used when approximating the model 2 . The biosensor action was modeled in stirred and non-stirred solutions. In this paper the input, output and operational requirements are defined for computer models to be executed in computational grids. A technique assuring an efficient usage of the grids to investigate the peculiarities of the biosensor response is defined. The introduced technique of computational grid usage was applied to perform computer simulation to investigate the peculiarities of the above-mentioned biosensor. An efficiency of the developed technique was investigated by comparing the time of calculation in the BalticGrid environment with the corresponding time in a local computer. The technique dependency on the size of the whole computational task and the quantity of subtasks distributed among different computing nodes in the grid was investigated. In the investigation there was noticeable delay when simulating biosensors response in the computational grid. This delay is caused by an approximately constant time for the grid middleware to process all tasks in the grid environment and the time of random tasks delayed in some computational nodes.