Departament de Ciencies Mèdiques Bàsiques, Universitat de Lleida and IRBLleida, Lleida, Spain.
Math Biosci. 2011 May;231(1):3-18. doi: 10.1016/j.mbs.2011.02.005. Epub 2011 Feb 15.
Most aspects of molecular biology can be understood in terms of biological design principles. These principles can be loosely defined as qualitative and quantitative features that emerge in evolution and recur more frequently than one would expect by chance alone in biological systems that perform a given type of process or function. Furthermore, such recurrence can be rationalized in terms of the functional advantage that the design provides to the system when compared with possible alternatives. This paper focuses on those design features that can be related to improved functional effectiveness of molecular and regulatory networks. We begin by reviewing assumptions and methods that underlie the study of such principles in molecular networks. We follow by discussing many of the design principles that have been found in genetic, metabolic, and signal transduction circuits. We concentrate mainly on results in the context of Biochemical Systems Theory, although we also briefly discuss other work. We conclude by discussing the importance of these principles for both, understanding the natural evolution of complex networks at the molecular level and for creating artificial biological systems with specific features.
大多数分子生物学的方面都可以根据生物设计原则来理解。这些原则可以被松散地定义为在进化中出现的定性和定量特征，并且在执行给定类型的过程或功能的生物系统中，比仅凭偶然更频繁地出现。此外，与可能的替代方案相比，这种出现可以根据设计为系统提供的功能优势来合理化。本文重点介绍了那些可以与分子和调节网络的功能有效性的提高相关的设计特征。我们首先回顾了在分子网络中研究这些原则所依据的假设和方法。然后，我们讨论了在遗传、代谢和信号转导电路中发现的许多设计原则。我们主要集中在生物化学系统理论的背景下的结果，尽管我们也简要讨论了其他工作。我们最后讨论了这些原则对于理解分子水平上复杂网络的自然进化以及创建具有特定特征的人工生物系统的重要性。
