Troy Ruths, Simulating the evolution of genetic networks

A major component of the machinery that determines a cell's behavior is a genetic network. Such a network consists of a graph in which nodes correspond to genes (or gene products), and edges correspond to "regulate" relationships; that is, an edge from node a to node b denotes that "gene a regulates gene b". The nodes and edges of this network are encoded in the genome, which resides in the cell's nucleus.

Advances in biotechnologies are enabling researchers to collect large amounts of data on these networks from different types of cells, as well as from different organisms. One powerful technique to analyze these data and elucidate information about their formation and functioning is comparative analysis. This type of analysis amounts to analyzing and understanding the evolution of a set of genetic networks.

In this talk, I will discuss evolutionary mechanisms that govern the evolution of these networks, and describe our work on developing a high-performance tool for simulating the evolution of networks in a "population setting". Such a simulator allows us to investigate important questions about the emergence of network properties.