Related papers: Morphogenesis at criticality?
Understanding the emergence of biological structures and their changes is a complex problem. On a biochemical level, it is based on gene regulatory networks (GRN) consisting on interactions between the genes responsible for cell…
Criticality has been conjectured as an integral part of neuronal network dynamics. Operating at a critical threshold requires precise parameter tuning and a corresponding mechanism remains an open question. Recent studies have suggested…
We study the role of phylogenetic trees on correlations in mutation processes. Generally, correlations decay exponentially with the generation number. We find that two distinct regimes of behavior exist. For mutation rates smaller than a…
The dynamics of adaptation is difficult to predict because it is highly stochastic even in large populations. The uncertainty emerges from number fluctuations, called genetic drift, arising in the small number of particularly fit…
Wetting phenomena, molecular protrusions of lipid bilayers and membrane stacks under lateral tension provide physical examples for interacting surfaces with tension. Such surfaces are studied theoretically using functional renormalization…
Stochastic thermodynamics gives universal relations for microscopic entropy production, yet its critical behavior at macroscopic nonequilibrium transitions remains unclassified. We study well-mixed reversible chemical reaction networks in…
During the development of an organism, cells must coordinate and organize to generate the correct shape, structure, and spatial patterns of tissues and organs, a process known as morphogenesis. The morphogenesis of embryonic tissues is…
It is widely accepted that the brain operates near a critical state, characterized by neural avalanches that follow power-law distributions. However, the functional rationale for why neural systems attain criticality remains unclear. Here,…
Large language models can exhibit unexpected behavior in the blink of an eye. In a recent computer use demo, a language model switched from coding to Googling pictures of Yellowstone, and these sudden shifts in behavior have also been…
Intracellular fluctuations, mainly triggered by gene expression, are an inevitable phenomenon observed in living cells. It influences generation of phenotypic diversity in genetically identical cells. Such variation of cellular components…
A celebrated and controversial hypothesis conjectures that some biological systems --parts, aspects, or groups of them-- may extract important functional benefits from operating at the edge of instability, halfway between order and…
Space-saving design is a requirement that is encountered in biological systems and the development of modern technological devices alike. Many living organisms dynamically pack their polymer chains, filaments or membranes inside of…
Granular materials, composed of discrete solid grains, can be modeled as simple mechanical systems. However, these materials can undergo spontaneous slow deformation, or creep, even under small forces and while in apparent mechanical…
Zonal jets manifest themselves as bands with sharp interfaces in the vorticity configuration. We develop an algorithm to track these fluctuating vorticity interfaces and systematically investigate their characteristic spatio-temporal…
Topological defects are fundamental to the collective dynamics of non-equilibrium systems and in active matter, mediating spontaneous flows, dynamic self-organization, and emergent pattern formation. Here, we reveal critical states in…
Critical phenomena arise ubiquitously in various context of physics, from condensed matter, high energy physics, cosmology, to biological systems, and consist of slow and long-distance fluctuations near a phase transition or critical point.…
Multi-type birth-death processes underlie approaches for inferring evolutionary dynamics from phylogenetic trees across biological scales, ranging from deep-time species macroevolution to rapid viral evolution and somatic cellular…
The development of new techniques to quantitatively measure gene expression in cells has shed light on a number of systems that display oscillations in protein concentration. Here we review the different mechanisms which can produce…
According to the criticality hypothesis, collective biological systems should operate in a special parameter region, close to so-called critical points, where the collective behavior undergoes a qualitative change between different…
The linear sigma model with linearized fluctuations of all involved fields facilitates the onset of a sequence of first-order phase transitions at a critical point. This phase structure has distinctive imprints on the photon emission rates.…