Guru10-spreads

(Circuit Board) Flickr • Mrs. Gemstone
BELOW:
A burnt out
circuit board.
WANT TO BUILD THE PERFECT SMARTPHONE?
But in research published in PLoS Computational
Biology1, Jeffrey Wong and colleagues found
that, surprisingly, trying to do everything at
once isn’t always the best option.
The team from Duke University, North Carolina,
investigated the wiring of one cellular circuit
– the E2-Factor (E2F) network. This network of
proteins and genes is the program for controlling
how our cells grow and proliferate – and
when they must die. The team asked a simple
question: what happens when you increase the
demand on E2F’s wiring? After all, unreasonable
demands on your phone might cause it to
crash (normally just as you’ve finished writing
a text message). So how do our cells’ cirucuitry
fare when pushed to the limit?
Wong and colleagues built a precise computer
simulation of E2F’s wiring, using algebra in
place of genes and proteins. (Similar techniques
are used to accurately predict everything from
air traffic to climate change to volcanic ash
clouds. They’ve been used in biology for almost
100 years.) The model was used to simulate the
cellular equivalent of an app overload - starting
a pair of tasks at the same time to pull E2F in
opposite directions. The virtual proteins might
have dealt with this by attempting the two
tasks simultaneously. But the team found that
this didn’t happen. As the strain or ‘tension’ in
the network increased, it would become less ‘robust’
and more liable to break or crash – with
disastrous consequences for the cell.
GURU • ISSUE 10 • FEBRUARY/MARCH 2013 • PAGE 48
Instead, the team found that the E2F network
copes by hopping between competing tasks – or
even by duplicating part of its wiring temporarily
to cope with the tug-o-war. And these findings
reflect real life: the real E2F network does
dynamically change as cells grow, divide, and
ultimately die.
Dr Wong believes E2F (and other circuits in
our cells) evolved to minimise the tension in
our cells’ wiring. He suggests that multitasking
in this way is an “evolutionary feasible” way of
“reusing a common set of components... to accomplish
multiple biological goals.”
Of course, today’s smartphones also juggle
tasks, giving priority to important apps and
keeping others ‘frozen’ or running in the background.
And yet there are still problems: internet
forums are plagued with complaints, customer
service hotlines glow in fury. Phones are
unreliable: sometimes they just crash. You see,
today’s smartphone developers have a problem:
demands keep changing. Tearing their hair out
behind easels and blueprints, developers are
forced to second-guess us, the fickle consumers.
Is it really possible to design a phone for everyone
– the teenage tweeter, the young professional,
and the ageless cynic who doesn’t care
about Angry Birds but would quite like to finish
a phone call without the battery running out?
The evolving cell discovered – as phone developers
are now realising – that there is often a balance
between functionality and reliability. Even
so, our cells still manage to co-ordinate and control
hundreds of processes – even while communicating
with their surroundings and defending
themselves against attack from the viruses in
the world around them. Given the similarities,
perhaps the truly smart smartphone developer
will be keeping an eye on cell biology research.
They might just save themselves millions of
years’ worth of trial and error.
References:
• Wong, J. V., Li, B. & You, L. (2012)
Tension and robustness in multitasking
cellular networks.
Doctor John Ankers is a researcher at the University of Liverpool’s Institute of Integrative
Biology. He’s normally found in a dark room looking at the inner workings
of cancer cells. Or sleeping. He won the BSCB Science Writing Prize in 2011 and
currently writes freelance for the MRC’s Biomedical Picture of the Day. He blogs
at toomanylivewires and you can follow him on Twitter @JohnnyAnkers.
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WHEN REALITY GOES DOWN THE RABBIT-HOLE
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