Stability of biological networks as represented in Random Boolean Nets.

Slepoy, Alexander ; Thompson, Marshall

Sandia National Laboratories

关键词: Network Analysis;    Biology.;    59 Basic Biological Sciences;    Biology;    Information Theory In Biology.;   

DOI  :  10.2172/919169
RP-ID  :  SAND2004-4185
RP-ID  :  AC04-94AL85000
RP-ID  :  919169

美国|英语

来源: UNT Digital Library

【 摘 要 】

We explore stability of Random Boolean Networks as a model of biological interaction networks. We introduce surface-to-volume ratio as a measure of stability of the network. Surface is defined as the set of states within a basin of attraction that maps outside the basin by a bit-flip operation. Volume is defined as the total number of states in the basin. We report development of an object-oriented Boolean network analysis code (Attract) to investigate the structure of stable vs. unstable networks. We find two distinct types of stable networks. The first type is the nearly trivial stable network with a few basins of attraction. The second type contains many basins. We conclude that second type stable networks are extremely rare.