Biological Feedback

Clearly explaining the logical analysis of biological control phenomena, Biological Feedback answers questions concerning everything from regulation to logic. This rare monograph presents a formal methodology for analyzing the dynamic behavior of complex systems. The easy-to-read text describes a simple logical formalization called "kinetic logic". The reader discovers how this method is used to predict all possible patterns of behavior of which a system is capable. It includes specific conditions required for each pattern. It also explains how to modify an incorrect model in order to account for the observed behavior. The authors give special attention to the two basic types of simple feedback loops: positive and negative. This volume is filled with easy-to-use tables, providing quick reference throughout the book. The subject matter is of great interest to everyone working in molecular genetics and developmental biology. Researchers, immunologists, physical chemists, physicists, electrical engineers, economists, and mathematicians will find this unique text to be an informative, indispensable resource.

Principles of Biological Regulation: An Introduction to Feedback Systems presents some understanding of control, regulatory, and feedback mechanisms in biological systems. This book discusses concepts related to the dynamic behavior of both individual biological processes and systems of processes that make up an organism. Comprised of 10 chapters, the book also describes the characteristics of biological feedback systems, focusing on the physical concepts. After briefly dealing with involved regulatory processes in biological systems, the book goes on discussing the flow or transport of material through a series of processes in the steady-state. Next chapter uses superposition principle to explain the changes that biological systems undergo following a disturbance or under dynamic behavior. The subsequent chapters cover the fundamental principles of negative biological feedback and to the effects it produces both under steady-state and dynamic behavior. Other chapters describe the effect of sinusoid signals on biological processes and present some stability criteria applied to technological systems and also their value in the study of homeostatic processes. The book also discusses some aspects of homeostats that seem to distinguish them from technological feedback systems. These features include not only the components themselves and their organization, but also the experimental problems involved in their study. The concluding chapters describe nonlinear behavior with great relevance to homeostatic systems and rate processes (production or destruction) for which the roles of stimulus and initial conditions are different. Mathematical relations developed from the conservation of mass and the mass action for chemical reactions are also presented. The book is an invaluable resource for life scientists and researchers.

An introduction to the mathematical, computational, and analytical techniques used for modeling biological rhythms, presenting tools from many disciplines and example applications. All areas of biology and medicine contain rhythms, and these behaviors are best understood through mathematical tools and techniques. This book offers a survey of mathematical, computational, and analytical techniques used for modeling biological rhythms, gathering these methods for the first time in one volume. Drawing on material from such disciplines as mathematical biology, nonlinear dynamics, physics, statistics, and engineering, it presents practical advice and techniques for studying biological rhythms, with a common language. The chapters proceed with increasing mathematical abstraction. Part I, on models, highlights the implicit assumptions and common pitfalls of modeling, and is accessible to readers with basic knowledge of differential equations and linear algebra. Part II, on behaviors, focuses on simpler models, describing common properties of biological rhythms that range from the firing properties of squid giant axon to human circadian rhythms. Part III, on mathematical techniques, guides readers who have specific models or goals in mind. Sections on “frontiers” present the latest research; “theory” sections present interesting mathematical results using more accessible approaches than can be found elsewhere. Each chapter offers exercises. Commented MATLAB code is provided to help readers get practical experience. The book, by an expert in the field, can be used as a textbook for undergraduate courses in mathematical biology or graduate courses in modeling biological rhythms and as a reference for researchers.

Cybernetics, a science concerned with understanding how systems are regulated, has reflected the preoccupations of the century in which it was born. Regulation is important in twentieth century society, where both machines and social organizations are complex. Cybernetics focused on and became primarily associated with the homeostasis or stability of system behavior and with the negative feedbacks that stabilize systems. It paid less attention to the processes opposite to negative feedback, the positive feedback processes that act to change systems. We attempt to redress the balance here by illustrating the enormous importance of positive feedbacks in natural systems. In an article in the American Scientist in 1963, Maruyama called for increased attention to this topic, noting that processes of change could occur when a "deviation in anyone component of the system caused deviations in other components that acted back on the first component to reinforce of amplify the initial deviation." The deviation amplification is the result of positive feedback among system components. Maruyama demonstrated by numerous examples that the neglect of such processes was unjustified and suggested that a new branch of cybernetics, "the second cybernetics," be devoted to their study.

Computer Simulation Analysis of Biological and Agricultural Systems focuses on the integration of mathematical models and the dynamic simulation essential to system analysis, design, and synthesis. The book emphasizes the quantitative dynamic relationships between elements and system responses. Problems of various degrees of difficulty and complexity are discussed to illustrate methods of computer-aided design and analysis that can bridge the gap between theories and applications. These problems cover a wide variety of subjects in the biological and agricultural fields. Specific guidelines and practical methods for defining requirements, developing specifications, and integrating system modeling early in simulation development are included as well. Computer Simulation Analysis of Biological and Agricultural Systems is an excellent text and self-guide for agricultural engineers, agronomists, foresters, horticulturists, soil scientists, mechanical engineers, and computer simulators.

Dan Chiras once again offers a refreshing and student-friendly introduction to the structure, function, health, and homeostasis of the human body in a modernized ninth edition of Human Biology. This acclaimed text explores life from a variety of levels and perspectives, including cellular/molecular, by body system, through disease, and within the environment.

Like engineering systems, biological systems must also operate effectively in the presence of internal and external uncertainty—such as genetic mutations or temperature changes, for example. It is not surprising, then, that evolution has resulted in the widespread use of feedback, and research in systems biology over the past decade has shown that feedback control systems are widely found in biology. As an increasing number of researchers in the life sciences become interested in control-theoretic ideas such as feedback, stability, noise and disturbance attenuation, and robustness, there is a need for a text that explains feedback control as it applies to biological systems. Written by established researchers in both control engineering and systems biology, Feedback Control in Systems Biology explains how feedback control concepts can be applied to systems biology. Filling the need for a text on control theory for systems biologists, it provides an overview of relevant ideas and methods from control engineering and illustrates their application to the analysis of biological systems with case studies in cellular and molecular biology. Control Theory for Systems Biologists The book focuses on the fundamental concepts used to analyze the effects of feedback in biological control systems, rather than the control system design methods that form the core of most control textbooks. In addition, the authors do not assume that readers are familiar with control theory. They focus on "control applications" such as metabolic and gene-regulatory networks rather than aircraft, robots, or engines, and on mathematical models derived from classical reaction kinetics rather than classical mechanics. Another significant feature of the book is that it discusses nonlinear systems, an understanding of which is crucial for systems biologists because of the highly nonlinear nature of biological systems. The authors cover tools and techniques for the analysis of linear and nonlinear systems; negative and positive feedback; robustness analysis methods; techniques for the reverse-engineering of biological interaction networks; and the analysis of stochastic biological control systems. They also identify new research directions for control theory inspired by the dynamic characteristics of biological systems. A valuable reference for researchers, this text offers a sound starting point for scientists entering this fascinating and rapidly developing field.