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Stochastic Boolean networks: an efficient approach to modeling gene regulatory networks.

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: Various computational models have been of interest due to their use in the modelling of gene regulatory networks (GRNs). As a logical model, probabilistic Boolean networks (PBNs) consider molecular and genetic noise, so the study of PBNs provides significant insights into the understanding of the dynamics of GRNs. This will ultimately lead to advances in developing therapeutic methods that intervene in the process of disease development and progression. The applications of PBNs, however, are hindered by the complexities involved in the computation of the state transition matrix and the steady-state distribution of a PBN. For a PBN with n genes and N Boolean networks, the complexity to compute the state transition matrix is O(nN22n) or O(nN2n) for a sparse matrix. RESULTS: This paper presents a novel implementation of PBNs based on the notions of stochastic logic and stochastic computation. This stochastic implementation of a PBN is referred to as a stochastic Boolean network (SBN). An SBN provides an accurate and efficient simulation of a PBN without and with random gene perturbation. The state transition matrix is computed in an SBN with a complexity of O(nL2n), where L is a factor related to the stochastic sequence length. Since the minimum sequence length required for obtaining an evaluation accuracy approximately increases in a polynomial order with the number of genes, n, and the number of Boolean networks, N, usually increases exponentially with n, L is typically smaller than N, especially in a network with a large number of genes. Hence, the computational efficiency of an SBN is primarily limited by the number of genes, but not directly by the total possible number of Boolean networks. Furthermore, a time-frame expanded SBN enables an efficient analysis of the steady-state distribution of a PBN. These findings are supported by the simulation results of a simplified p53 network, several randomly generated networks and a network inferred from a T cell immune response dataset. An SBN can also implement the function of an asynchronous PBN and is potentially useful in a hybrid approach in combination with a continuous or single-molecule level stochastic model. CONCLUSIONS: Stochastic Boolean networks (SBNs) are proposed as an efficient approach to modelling gene regulatory networks (GRNs). The SBN approach is able to recover biologically-proven regulatory behaviours, such as the oscillatory dynamics of the p53-Mdm2 network and the dynamic attractors in a T cell immune response network. The proposed approach can further predict the network dynamics when the genes are under perturbation, thus providing biologically meaningful insights for a better understanding of the dynamics of GRNs. The algorithms and methods described in this paper have been implemented in Matlab packages, which are attached as Additional files.

SUBMITTER: Liang J

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3532238 | biostudies-literature | 2012

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Stochastic Boolean networks: an efficient approach to modeling gene regulatory networks.

Liang Jinghang J Han Jie J

BMC systems biology 20120828

<h4>Background</h4>Various computational models have been of interest due to their use in the modelling of gene regulatory networks (GRNs). As a logical model, probabilistic Boolean networks (PBNs) consider molecular and genetic noise, so the study of PBNs provides significant insights into the understanding of the dynamics of GRNs. This will ultimately lead to advances in developing therapeutic methods that intervene in the process of disease development and progression. The applications of PBN ...[more]

PMID: 22929591

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Project description:In a gene regulatory network (GRN), gene expressions are affected by noise, and stochastic fluctuations exist in the interactions among genes. These stochastic interactions are context dependent, thus it becomes important to consider noise in a context-sensitive manner in a network model. As a logical model, context-sensitive probabilistic Boolean networks (CSPBNs) account for molecular and genetic noise in the temporal context of gene functions. In a CSPBN with n genes and k contexts, however, a computational complexity of O(nk222n) (or O(nk2n)) is required for an accurate (or approximate) computation of the state transition matrix (STM) of the size (2n ? k) × (2n ? k) (or 2n × 2n). The evaluation of a steady state distribution (SSD) is more challenging. Recently, stochastic Boolean networks (SBNs) have been proposed as an efficient implementation of an instantaneous PBN.The notion of stochastic Boolean networks (SBNs) is extended for the general model of PBNs, i.e., CSPBNs. This yields a novel structure of context-sensitive SBNs (CSSBNs) for modeling the stochasticity in a GRN. A CSSBN enables an efficient simulation of a CSPBN with a complexity of O(nLk2n) for computing the state transition matrix, where L is a factor related to the required sequence length in CSSBN for achieving a desired accuracy. A time-frame expanded CSSBN can further efficiently simulate the stationary behavior of a CSPBN and allow for a tunable tradeoff between accuracy and efficiency. The CSSBN approach is more efficient than an analytical method and more accurate than an approximate analysis.Context-sensitive stochastic Boolean networks (CSSBNs) are proposed as an efficient approach to modeling the effects of gene perturbation and intervention in gene regulatory networks. A CSSBN analysis provides biologically meaningful insights into the oscillatory dynamics of the p53-Mdm2 network in a context-switching environment. It is shown that random gene perturbation has a greater effect on the final distribution of the steady state of a network compared to context switching activities. The CSSBN approach can further predict the steady state distribution of a glioma network under gene intervention. Ultimately, this will help drug discovery and develop effective drug intervention strategies.

Project description:BACKGROUND: Qualitative dynamics of small gene regulatory networks have been studied in quite some details both with synchronous and asynchronous analysis. However, both methods have their drawbacks: synchronous analysis leads to spurious attractors and asynchronous analysis lacks computational efficiency, which is a problem to simulate large networks. We addressed this question through the analysis of a major biosynthesis pathway. Indeed the cholesterol synthesis pathway plays a pivotal role in dislypidemia and, ultimately, in cancer through intermediates such as mevalonate, farnesyl pyrophosphate and geranyl geranyl pyrophosphate, but no dynamic model of this pathway has been proposed until now. RESULTS: We set up a computational framework to dynamically analyze large biological networks. This framework associates a classical and computationally efficient synchronous Boolean analysis with a newly introduced method based on Markov chains, which identifies spurious cycles among the results of the synchronous simulation. Based on this method, we present here the results of the analysis of the cholesterol biosynthesis pathway and its physiological regulation by the Sterol Response Element Binding Proteins (SREBPs), as well as the modeling of the action of statins, inhibitor drugs, on this pathway. The in silico experiments show the blockade of the cholesterol endogenous synthesis by statins and its regulation by SREPBs, in full agreement with the known biochemical features of the pathway. CONCLUSION: We believe that the method described here to identify spurious cycles opens new routes to compute large and biologically relevant models, thanks to the computational efficiency of synchronous simulation. Furthermore, to the best of our knowledge, we present here the first dynamic systems biology model of the human cholesterol pathway and several of its key regulatory control elements, hoping it would provide a good basis to perform in silico experiments and confront the resulting properties with published and experimental data. The model of the cholesterol pathway and its regulation, along with Boolean formulae used for simulation are available on our web site http://Bioinformaticsu613.free.fr. Graphical results of the simulation are also shown online. The SBML model is available in the BioModels database http://www.ebi.ac.uk/biomodels/ with submission ID: MODEL0568648427.

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Stochastic Boolean networks: an efficient approach to modeling gene regulatory networks.

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Stochastic Boolean networks: an efficient approach to modeling gene regulatory networks.

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