Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
also refrained from discriminating explictly between the two chief strategies for
scientific understanding, i.e. by unification through subsumption to laws and
understanding in terms of causation through mechanisms.
4.2. Systems biology: What it is
From the above aims and from the background of the limitations of molecular
biology and functional genomics, one may surmise which activities are nec-
essary for a successful systems biology. Many of the tools and techniques of
functional genomics are in place as are the techniques from molecular biology
and biochemistry. In view of the complexity of the subject matter, and because
a focus on parts is ultimately not advised, our present strategy is to focus on
a single system of life that is relatively autonomous. Ultimately this should
result in a complete living organism being the object of study, and as scientific
data and knowledge become distributed and available to all via the Internet this
is increasingly possible in a coherent manner. At first these are likely to be
unicellular microorganisms, or relatively autonomous subsystems thereof. The
mathematical tools will be discussed in more detail below.
Figure 2 therefore shows some of the elements of the systems biology agenda
(Kell, 2006). It gives a certain primacy to the system of interest as a circle in the
centre. However, while specifics of methods will vary between organisms and
Genome-wide
protein-metabolite
binding constants
Genome-wide
protein-protein
binding constants
Regulatory interactions
Genome-wide
high-throughput
enzyme kinetics
Transcriptome
Proteome
Metabolome
Model organism/
system of choice
Genome-wide
protein-inhibitor
binding constants
(Chemical genetics)
Database, schema
standards
Modelling; ODEs, constraint-based optimisation,
solving inverse problems, novel strategies
Figure 2
Some elements of the systems biology agenda. These are purposely not
interconnected in this figure for reasons of clarity.
