In biology, scientists typically conduct experiments first, and then develop mathematical or computer models afterward to show how the collected data fit with theory. In his work, Rob Phillips flips that practice on its head. The Caltech biophysicist tackles questions in cellular biology as a physicist would—by first formulating a model that can make predictions and then testing those predictions. Using this strategy, Phillips and his group have recently developed a mathematical model that accounts for the way genes compete with each other for the proteins that regulate their expression.
A paper describing the work appears in the current issue of the journal Cell. The lead authors on the paper are Robert Brewster and Franz Weinert, postdoctoral scholars in Phillips’s lab.
via An Equation to Describe the Competition Between Genes | Caltech.
Biosingularity 