🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <BzsBw2.HF7@iat.holonet.net>, I wrote:

>I'm interested in calculating the communication bandwidth of mRNA in a 
>typical cell.  Does anyone have any information/references regarding the 
>rate of production of mRNA (per cell) or rate of protein synthesis. 

Let me back up a notch.

First, insert protocol statements, please, thank you, eternally grateful,
etc.

Question, does anyone have any thoughts/references about the idea of
viewing the nucleus of a eukaryotic cell as sort of a computer CPU, with
DNA playing the part of read only memory?

In the chain of thought I'm working on, it would be useful to know the rate
at which mRNA transfers information from the nucleus to the ribosomes.

Anyone?


--
Ken Easlon                | "...somebody spoke and I went into a dream..."
ken@holonet.net           |    -Paul McCartney
Pleasantly Unaffiliated   |

In article <Bzy7Fz.M38@iat.holonet.net> ken@iat.holonet.net (Ken Easlon) writes:
>
>Question, does anyone have any thoughts/references about the idea of
>viewing the nucleus of a eukaryotic cell as sort of a computer CPU, with
>DNA playing the part of read only memory?
>
>--
>Ken Easlon                | "...somebody spoke and I went into a dream..."
>ken@holonet.net           |    -Paul McCartney
>Pleasantly Unaffiliated   |

(Lots deleted from your post)

Well, Douglas Hosfstadter constructs an analogy between DNA and formalized
number theory (which can be thought of perhaps as being related to computers)
but that may be a bit far for you to go....   I enjoyed reading it, though,
so I thought I'd bring the book up (_Godel, Escher, Bach:an Eternal Golden
Braid_).

Anyway, I would bet you'll find the bandwidth is pretty high, but I'd be
curious about the resulting number.

In article <Bzy7Fz.M38@iat.holonet.net> ken@iat.holonet.net (Ken Easlon) writes:
>Question, does anyone have any thoughts/references about the idea of
>viewing the nucleus of a eukaryotic cell as sort of a computer CPU, with
>DNA playing the part of read only memory?

I forget the specific reference, and I only looked at the abstract
(didn't try to read the paper) but there was at least one article in
the Journal of Theoretical Biology in the past year or two which
attempted to describe ribosomal action in terms of a deterministic
pushdown automaton.

-- 
	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
Christopher Ian Connolly			connolly@cs.umass.edu
Laboratory for Perceptual Robotics		wa2ifi
University of Massachusetts at Amherst		Amherst, MA 01003

>In article <Bzy7Fz.M38@iat.holonet.net> ken@iat.holonet.net (Ken Easlon) writes:
>...viewing the nucleus of a eukaryotic cell as sort of a computer CPU, with
>DNA playing the part of read only memory

The reference I was thinking of is:

Collado-Vides J, "A Syntactic Representation of Units of Genetic Information -- A Syntax
of Units of Genetic Information", J. Theor. Biol. 148:401-429, 1991

...and a quick look at it reveals that it's not as specific as I
thought it was, but does claim that the "grammar" of DNA is not
regular.
					-CC
-- 
	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
Christopher Ian Connolly			connolly@cs.umass.edu
Laboratory for Perceptual Robotics		wa2ifi
University of Massachusetts at Amherst		Amherst, MA 01003