Parameter estimation applied to physiological systems

Parameter estimation techniques are of ever-increasing interest in the fields of medicine and biology, as greater efforts are currently being made to describe physiological systems in explicit quantitative form. Although some of the techniques of parameter estimation as developed for use in other engineering and scientific problems may be carried over into physiology, it has nevertheless been necessary to re-examine the entire procedure of estimation, from model formulation to computer selection. The results of this re-examination, as set forth in this paper, give some guidance as to the selection of techniques for the estimation of the parameters of physiological systems