Robust Molecular Computation by Active Mechanics

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that active mechanical processes in cells can enhance the accuracy and robustness of molecular information processing by dynamically correcting errors, outperforming passive static structures.

Contribution

It introduces a model showing how active stresses can serve as error correction mechanisms in cellular molecular circuits, improving reliability over passive systems.

Findings

Active stresses dynamically suppress errors in molecular signaling.

Active mechanisms outperform static clusters in error correction.

Robust cellular computation is achieved through active mechanical processes.

Abstract

The living cell expends energetic and material resources to reliably process information from its environment. To do so, it utilises unreliable molecular circuitry that is subject to thermal and other fluctuations. Here, we argue that active, physical processes can provide error correcting mechanisms for information processing. We analyse a model in which fluctuating receptor activation induces contractile stresses that recruit further receptors, dynamically controlling resource usage and accuracy. We show that this active scheme can outperform passive, static clusters (as formed, for instance, by protein crosslinking). We consider simple binary environments, informative decision trees, and chemical computations; in each case, active stresses serve to contextually build signalling platforms that dynamically suppress error and allows for robust cellular computation.