MODELLING FOR CONTROL: UNDERSTANDING ROLE AND FUNCTION OF REGULATORY NETWORKS IN MICROORGANISMS

摘要

Microorganisms maintain a constant monitoring of extra-cellular physicochemical conditions in order to respond and modify their gene expression patterns accordingly. Modelling plays an essential role in developing an understanding of the regulatory networks in microorganisms. Means-end analysis, also called functional modelling, is proposed as a methodology to model regulatory networks. A modelling example for the E. coli lac operon illustrates that the methodology allows breaking down complex regulatory networks into elementary building blocks. The proposed modelling formalism enables a straightforward communication between systems engineers and biologists on the mechanisms underlying complex regulatory functions. Copyright? 2005 IFAC.