Functional Coherence of Molecular Networks in Bioinformatics [Paperback]

Molecular networks provide descriptions of the organization of various biological processes, including cellular signaling, metabolism, and genetic regulation. Knowledge on molecular networks is commonly used for systems level analysis of biological function; research and method development in this area has grown tremendously in the past few years. This book will provide a detailed review of existing knowledge on the functional characterization of biological networks. In 15 chapters authored by an international group of prolific systems biology and bioinformatics researchers, it will organize, conceptualize, and summarize the existing core of research results and computational methods on understanding biological function from a network perspective.

Introduction to Network Biology.- Topological Characteristics of Molecular Networks.- Functional Annotation in Gene Networks.- Proteome Network Emulating Models.- Biological Network Alignment.- Pattern Mining across many Massive Biological Networks.- Molecular Networks and Complex Diseases.- Moving Towards Genome-Scale Kinetic Models: The Mass Action Stoichiometric Simulation Approach.- Index.

A fundamental problem in life sciences is the characterization of biological function. In medical sciences, understanding the bases of functional anomalies holds the key to effective diagnosis, treatment,? and prognosis; in genetics, functional annotation of genetic variability uncovers the complex relationship between genotype and phenotype; in evolutionary biology, functional differences between diverse organisms highlight the evolutionary mechanisms that underlie the complexity of biological systems. With the successful completion of the human genome project and recent technological advances in biological data collection, it has become possible to study biological function from a systems perspective. Today, Systems Biology is established as a fundamental interdisciplinary science, which focuses on systeml“}