The physical language of molecular codes: A rate-distortion approach to the evolution and emergence of biological codes

TL;DR

This paper applies rate-distortion theory to understand how molecular codes like the genetic code evolve and emerge, framing it as an optimal information channel design problem influenced by biological fitness and resource costs.

Contribution

It introduces a novel rate-distortion framework to model the emergence and evolution of molecular codes as phase transitions in information channels.

Findings

Molecular code emergence can be modeled as a phase transition.

Organism fitness depends on code quality and resource costs.

The approach links biological evolution to communication theory.

Abstract

The function of the organism hinges on the performance of its information-processing networks, which convey information via molecular recognition. Many paths within these networks utilize molecular codebooks, such as the genetic code, to translate information written in one class of molecules into another molecular "language" . The present paper examines the emergence and evolution of molecular codes in terms of rate-distortion theory and reviews recent results of this approach. We discuss how the biological problem of maximizing the fitness of an organism by optimizing its molecular coding machinery is equivalent to the communication engineering problem of designing an optimal information channel. The fitness of a molecular code takes into account the interplay between the quality of the channel and the cost of resources which the organism needs to invest in its construction and maintenance. We analyze the dynamics of a population of organisms that compete according to the fitness of their codes. The model suggests a generic mechanism for the emergence of molecular codes as a phase transition in an information channel. This mechanism is put into biological context and demonstrated in a simple example.