On the role of conserved moieties in shaping the robustness and production capabilities of reaction networks

2008/10/29 by Andrea De Martino, De Martino, Andrea, Carlotta Martelli +3
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · Physics and Astronomy · #Disordered Systems and Neural Networks (cond-mat.dis-nn) #FOS: Biological sciences #FOS: Physical sciences #Molecular Networks (q-bio.MN) #cond-mat.dis-nn #q-bio.MN

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.0810.5222

6 pages

arxiv created 2008/10/29 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01

Abstract

We study a simplified, solvable model of a fully-connected metabolic network with constrained quenched disorder to mimic the conservation laws imposed by stoichiometry on chemical reactions. Within a spin-glass type of approach, we show that in presence of a conserved metabolic pool the flux state corresponding to maximal growth is stationary independently of the pool size. In addition, and at odds with the case of unconstrained networks, the volume of optimal flux configurations remains finite, indicating that the frustration imposed by stoichiometric constraints, while reducing growth capabilities, confers robustness and flexibility to the system. These results have a clear biological interpretation and provide a basic, fully analytical explanation to features recently observed in real metabolic networks.

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