Related papers: Maximal information transmission is compatible wit…
Intracellular transmission of information via chemical and transcriptional networks is thwarted by a physical limitation: the finite copy number of the constituent chemical species introduces unavoidable intrinsic noise. Here we provide a…
Motivated by recent discoveries of microbial communities that transfer electrons across centimeter-length scales, this paper studies the information capacity of bacterial cables via electron transfer, which coexists with molecular…
A path information is defined in connection with the different possible paths of chaotic system moving in its phase space between two cells. On the basis of the assumption that the paths are differentiated by their actions, we show that the…
We consider here how to separate multidimensional signals into two categories, such that the binary decision transmits the maximum possible information transmitted about those signals. Our motivation comes from the nervous system, where…
Eukaryotic cell development has been optimized by natural selection to obey maximal intracellular flux of messenger proteins. This, in turn, implies maximum Fisher information on angular position about a target nuclear pore complex (NPR).…
Signal transduction in biological cells is effected by signaling pathways that typically include multiple feedback loops. Here we analyze information transfer through a prototypical signaling module with biochemical feedback. The module…
To maintain homeostasis, living cells process information with networks of interacting molecules. Traditional models for cellular information processing have focused on networks of chemical reactions between molecules. Here, we describe how…
Coordinated responses to environmental stimuli are critical for multicellular organisms. To overcome the obstacles of cell-to-cell heterogeneity and noisy signaling dynamics within individual cells, cells must effectively exchange…
The precision of concentration sensing is improved when cells communicate. Here we derive the physical limits to concentration sensing for cells that communicate over short distances by directly exchanging small molecules (juxtacrine…
The metabolic network plays a crucial role in regulating bacterial metabolism and growth, but it is subject to inherent molecular stochasticity. Previous studies have utilized flux balance analysis and the maximum entropy method to predict…
In order to transmit biochemical signals, biological regulatory systems dissipate energy with concomitant entropy production. Additionally, signaling often takes place in challenging environmental conditions. In a simple model regulatory…
Living tissue is able to withstand large stresses in everyday life, yet it also actively adapts to dynamic loads. This remarkable mechanical behaviour emerges from the interplay between living cells and their non-living extracellular…
Bacterial chemotactic sensing converts noisy chemical signals into running and tumbling. We analyze the static sensing limits of mixed Tar/Tsr chemoreceptor clusters in individual Escherichia coli cells using a heterogeneous…
Genetic regulatory circuits universally cope with different sources of noise that limit their ability to coordinate input and output signals. In many cases, optimal regulatory performance can be thought to correspond to configurations of…
In the simplest view of transcriptional regulation, the expression of a gene is turned on or off by changes in the concentration of a transcription factor (TF). We use recent data on noise levels in gene expression to show that it should be…
A recurrent idea in the study of complex systems is that optimal information processing is to be found near bifurcation points or phase transitions. However, this heuristic hypothesis has few (if any) concrete realizations where a standard…
Cells perform directed motion in response to external stimuli that they detect by sensing the environment with their membrane protrusions. In particular, several biochemical and biophysical cues give rise to tactic migration in the…
Biological and living organisms sense and process information from their surroundings, typically having access only to a subset of external observables for a limited amount of time. In this work, we uncover how biological systems can…
Many foraging microorganisms rely upon cellular transport networks to deliver nutrients, fluid and organelles between different parts of the organism. Networked organisms ranging from filamentous fungi to slime molds demonstrate a…
Living cells must control the reading out or "expression" of information encoded in their genomes, and this regulation often is mediated by transcription factors--proteins that bind to DNA and either enhance or repress the expression of…