Systems biology: From the cell to the brain

TL;DR

This paper discusses the shift in biological research towards understanding complex systems through network interactions at cellular and neural levels, highlighting common themes in systems biology.

Contribution

It introduces the concept of systems-level analysis in biology, emphasizing network interactions within cells and between cells, including the nervous system.

Findings

Identification of common themes in cellular and neural networks

Emphasis on dynamical processes at different biological scales

Highlighting the importance of systems-level approaches

Abstract

With the completion of human genome mapping, the focus of scientists seeking to explain the biological complexity of living systems is shifting from analyzing the individual components (such as a particular gene or biochemical reaction) to understanding the set of interactions amongst the large number of components that results in the different functions of the organism. To this end, the area of systems biology attempts to achieve a "systems-level" description of biology by focusing on the network of interactions instead of the characteristics of its isolated parts. In this article, we briefly describe some of the emerging themes of research in "network" biology, looking at dynamical processes occurring at the two different length scales of within the cell and between cells, viz., the intra-cellular signaling network and the nervous system. We show that focusing on the systems-level aspects of these problems allows one to observe surprising and illuminating common themes amongst them.