Welcome to the DEBtox information site
Welcome to the DEBtox information page, the
site for people that want to make sense of ecotoxicity data.
This site contains information on mechanistic models for the
analysis of stressor effects on the life-history traits of
individual organisms (and from there to higher and lower
levels of biological organisation). Specifically, this site
is about models based on animal energy budgets (DEBtox and DEBkiss) and survival models
from the GUTS framework.
This website constitutes a node in the international DEBnet
network, together with the associated site of DEBtox Research.
The mission of DEBtox.info is to simplify biology to
get to the essence of what toxicants (and other stresses)
are actually doing to organisms. Simplification is necessary
if we need to gain understanding. Furthermore, we cannot
expect to test even a small fraction of all possible
(combinations of) toxicants, species and environmental
conditions. Once we get to the essence, it is possible to
make educated predictions of toxicant effects for untested
chemicals, untested species, and under untested conditions.
Here, you can find information, lists of relevant
publications, (links to) free e-books, and freely
downloadable Matlab packages to analyse your data. Use the
major categories on the top left of the screen to navigate
through this site; the corresponding sub-categories will
appear right next to it in the submenu.
BREAKING NEWS!
The free and open-source software
openGUTS is now available for download!
It is available as a standalone Windows executable
or as Matlab package. It supports the use of GUTS for regulatory
purposes, but will also prove useful for scientific
studies. The dedicated website http://openguts.info/
provides more information.
WARNING!
A calculation error was spotted in openGUTS,
which may affect IT calibrations/predictions
for specific types of exposure scenarios.
The Matlab version has been updated to v1.1
to repair this. For more information, see
the openGUTS
website. An update of the standalone
will become available early 2021.
WARNING! For
users of BYOM versions before v. 4.3, see the notes
and warnings on the BYOM page
(bottom of page). If
you are working with BYOM, and would like to be
notified immediately in case of errors, new
versions, etc., email me
and I will include you in a mailing list. I may also
use this mailing list for other important
developments such as new (versions) of the e-books,
and new papers. This saves you the hassle of
checking this website every week ;-).
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Upcoming courses and events
- We planned to provide regular GUTS courses, but these
plans are put on ice for the moment. More information.
- In Sept./Oct. 2021, we will offer our much-praised
summer school "Dynamic modelling of toxic effects" (so
its more of an Autumn course this time). The format will
be somewhat different, combining more on-line pre-course
and less on-site intensive training. More information on
the course page. Download
2021 flyer.
- Roman Ashauer and myself gave an on-line short course
on openGUTS at the
2020 SETAC SciCon. This course is now available for
everyone via Leanpub: https://leanpub.com/c/openguts.
Although you don't get the interaction with the
instructors, this is still a nice way to educate
yourself in quarantine.
- There will likely be another openGUTS short course at
the 2021 SETAC SciCon in May 2021. More information will
follow.
- In May 2021, there will be the next run of the DEB
school and the DEB symposium. This time, the venue is
Halifax, Canada. More
information. Note that part of the DEB school will
be in tele mode, and there probably will be some way to
join the symposium in virtual mode as well.
- In July 2021, you have the opportunity to join the
PREDITOX school in Lyon, France. This is a course on
modelling and statistics for ecotoxicologists, focussing
on Bayesian inference. Download the 2021
flyer.
Job opportunities for modellers
- Nothing at the moment (that I know of).
Latest news
- 25 February 2021: new version 1.1 of the openGUTS
software. See the
openGUTS downloads page.
- 9 February 2021: Error in the BYOM/engine files
calc_epx and calc_ecx when used in conjunction with the
slice sampler (in Bayesian analyses). The confidence
intervals take min-max of the output rather than
percentiles (they will thus be too wide).This will be
repaired in the next update of BYOM.
- 27 January 2021: New paper from Sylvain Bart on
mixtures with GUTS in ES&T, see https://doi.org/10.1002/ieam.4333.
- 9 January 2021: Best wishes for the new year! Forgot
to announce a new paper on the algorithm used in
openGUTS for calibration and error propagation. It was
accepted in August, but still only available in 'early
view': DOI:
10.1002/ieam.4333
- 11 October 2020: our 2011 GUTS paper has now reached
200 citations in Web of Science!
- 28 September 2020: spotted an error in the
no-shrinking equations that are used in the DEBkiss and
DEBtox2019 packages. This error could bias calibrations,
though the simulations were fine. These packages are
thus updated. This error does not affect the
DEBtox_classic package since there is no option to
prevent shrinking in that one. See
the BYOM page.
- 26-27 September 2020: update of the BYOM tox-related
packages. GUTS package: this update is especially a good
idea when using the ODE-solver versions in the
"experimental" folder. DEBtox2019 and DEBtox_classic
packages: more efficient/accurate ODE solving for
time-varying exposure. For all these packages: now
allowing double time points in the exposure definition
(as in openGUTS). See the BYOM page.
- 24 September 2020: update for BYOM to version 5.2.
Modified the parameter-space explorer to work reasonable
well for 6/7 free parameters (best left to experts).
Further modifications for time-varying exposure, now
allowing double time entries like in openGUTS and
efficiency improved for hard-pulsed exposure (these
changes also require updates for the packages that use
glo.break_time ... working on that!). See the BYOM page.
Older news over here.
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