Quantifying the notions of canalizing and master genes in a gene regulatory network-a Boolean network modeling perspective

摘要

Motivation: Canalizing genes enforce broad corrective actions on cellular processes for the purpose of biological robustness maintaining a constant phenotype to remain unchanged in spite of genetic mutations or environmental perturbations. Despite their central role in biological systems, the observation/detection of canalizing genes is often impeded because the behavior of affected genes is highly varied relative to the inactive canalizer. Therefore, the activity of canalizing genes is difficult to predict to any significant degree by their subject genes under normal cell conditions.