| Summary: | Human papillomavirus (HPV), a major sexually-transmitted disease, causes cervical cancer, in addition to numerous other cancers in females and males. This thesis uses mathematical modeling, theory and simulations to study the transmission dynamics of HPV, and associated dysplasia, in a community. A new deterministic model is designed and used to assess the population-level impact of Pap cytology screening on the transmission dynamics of the disease in a community. The model is rigorously analyzed for its dynamical features, vis-a-vis determining the conditions for the effective control (or elimination) and persistence of the disease. Furthermore, the effect of uncertainties in the estimates of the parameter values used in the numerical simulations of the model is accounted for via uncertainty and sensitivity analysis. Simulations of the model show that Pap screening dramatically reduces the incidence of cervical cancer in the community.
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