Parts and wholes, shapes and holes in living beings

The Shape of Things - SHAPES 1.0

自然科学(总论);计算机科学

Janna Hastings1 ; 2 ; Colin Batchelor3 ; and Stefan Schulz4 ; 5

Others  :  http://ceur-ws.org/Vol-812/paper12.pdf
PID  :  41925

来源: CEUR

【 摘 要 】

All living beings are constituted by molecular entities con-tinuously interacting with each other in the complex patterns through which organic material is created and sustained. From the very small to the very large, such interactions involve three-dimensional objects which fit together by virtue of their complementary shapes. Like the pieces in a jigsaw puzzle, parts of objects fit into holes in other objects as they unite to form wholes, which in turn form the parts that combine to form wholes at increasing levels of granularity. Function follows form, and accurate description of the shapes of such molecular entities entails improved reasoning about their activities in biological systems. How- ever, the dynamic, flexible and multi-granular nature of living material presents several challenges for the notions of shapes and holes, analyses of which have thus far largely focused on the shapes of static objects at the everyday perceptual level of granularity. We focus on two such challenges: describing the shapes of objects that change over time, and extending the definition of holes (and their linings) to one that applies