Format:
Online-Ressource (110 p. = 3978 KB, text and images)
Content:
Genetic regulion, complex networks, mathematical modeling, evolution, robustness. - Living organisms are remarkably robust despite fluctuating concentrations of functional molecules in the cell and changing environmental conditions. In the biological literature, the question how organisms cope with this stochasticity has been investigated in theory and experiment in specific organisms. To identify and understand general mechanisms that facilitate reliable dynamical behavior, computer modelling can be useful to investigate specific effects in isolation. In this thesis, the effect of the topological structure of transcriptional regulation networks on the reliability of the resulting dynamics is investigated in simple dynamical models. The activity of genes and proteins is modeled by discrete values. An extension of this discrete dynamical model to continuous time is used and molecular fluctuations are implemented by random delays of signals. Reliability of the dynamics is defined as ordered dynamical behavior despite these fluctuations. Using this criterion, simple systems of interacting genes as well as the model organism budding yeast S. cerevisiae are investigated. The reliability of the cell-cycle regulation is assessed and simple mechanisms of the regulational organization are identified which lead to the robust dynamical behavior. Further, the recently discovered feature ...
Note:
Bremen, Univ., Diss., 2008
Language:
English
Keywords:
Hochschulschrift
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