iTHEMS生物学セミナー

Application of bioenergetics to microbial modeling

2021年7月29日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

瀬戸 繭美 (奈良女子大学 理学部 化学生物環境科学科 助教)

Bioenergetics, the study of thermodynamics as applied to biological systems, aims to understand how energy flows through a living system. Since thermodynamics provides a framework for predicting the progress of a spontaneous reaction and for harnessing the energy released, bioenergetics can help us to understand the ecological processes of chemotrophic microorganisms that harvest metabolic energy from various chemical reactions. In this talk, I will introduce a theoretical model as an attempt to describe the growth of chemotrophic microorganisms in terms of the interrelationships between microbial activities and the change in Gibbs energy of a system. Based on our findings and previous literature in the field, I will discuss ecological insights into microbial ecosystems thriving in low-energy environment.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

How nucleus size affects chromatin motion? - Experimental measurements and a polymer physics theory

2021年7月1日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

坂上 貴洋 (青山学院大学 理工学部物理・数理学科 准教授)

Chromatin moves dynamically inside the cell nucleus, and its motion is often correlated with gene functions such as DNA recombination and transcription. A recent study has shown that during early embryogenesis of the nematode, Caenorhabditis elegans, the chromatin motion markedly decreases with the cell stage. However, the underlying mechanism for this transition has yet to be elucidated. Here we systematically investigate the impact of nuclear size to demonstrate that it is indeed a decisive factor in chromatin mobility. We show that a simple theoretical description, which takes into account the length and time scales of chromatin polymer solution, can quantitatively describe the relationship between the nucleus size and the chromatin motion in vivo. Our results emphasize a regulatory role of nuclear size in restricting chromatin motion, and a generic polymer physics model plays a guiding role in capturing this essential feature. *Please refer to the email to get access to the Zoom meeting room.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

Period variability can provide valuable information in oscillatory systems

2021年6月24日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

森 史 (九州大学 大学院芸術工学研究院 デザイン人間科学部門 助教)

Biological clocks generate temporally precise oscillations although they are subjected to various types of noise. In other words, oscillations with only a small variability in the period are observed under action of noise. In this talk, I focus on period variability in coupled phase oscillators and complex oscillatory dynamical systems, and present the following topics:(i) A phase oscillator subjected to noise can become to generate more precise oscillations not only when it is synchronized with periodic signal but also when it is mutually synchronized with another phase oscillator with stronger noise. (ii) In complex oscillatory dynamical systems, period variability is sensitive to the choice of an output variable and output checkpoint; it can be reduced by an appropriate selection of them. (iii) Noise intensity and coupling strength in synchronized phase oscillators can be inferred from data about period variability. This talk is based on joint researches with Dr. Hiroshi Kori (Tokyo Univ) and Dr. Alexander Mikhailov (Kanazawa Univ). *Please refer to the email to get access to the Zoom meeting room.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

The origin and dispersal of buckwheat

2021年6月10日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

ジェフリ・フォーセット (数理創造プログラム 上級研究員)

Buckwheat, which soba noodles is made from, originated from a wild species that is distributed in southwest China, around Yunnan, Sichuan, and Tibet. We are trying to understand when, where, and how it originated and then spread across the world and came to Japan. To do so, we are using genomic data of wild samples from China and cultivated samples from various parts of the world. I will give a brief introduction about buckwheat, explain what we already know about its origin and dispersal, and show a bit of our results. I will also explain the significance of studying "domestication", that is, the process that plants/animals that humans currently use originated from their ancestral wild species. *Please refer to the email to get access to the Zoom meeting room.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

An overview of genome-wide epistasis and co-selection analysis

2021年6月3日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

許 インイン (数理創造プログラム 基礎科学特別研究員)

This talk is a summary of research that have done by me and my team during 2016~2019. I was a postdoc researcher in Aalto university/Helsinki university in Finland. In the team, a worldwide active collaboration has happened between many fields including statistical physics, biology, computer science and statistics. The target is to analyze ultra-high dimensional large population genomic datasets of two major human pathogens, Streptococcus pneumoniae and Neisseria meningitidis, without phenotypic data. Interacting networks of resistance, virulence and core machinery genes are identified. Many different approaches have been invented and they can be generally applied to other datasets with similar mathematical setting. I will explain methods based on statistical model [1,2], mutual information [3], and theoretical performance analysis for statistical model [4]. In the end, I will briefly introduce a new phenomenon of random matrix which is discovered during the research process for statistical significance filtering [5]. *Please refer to the email to get access to the Zoom meeting room.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

A Mathematical Model for Stem Cell Competition to Maintain a Cell Pool Injured by Radiation Exposure

2021年5月27日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

内之宮 光紀 (電力中央研究所)

Cancer risk of low-dose-rate ionizing radiation exposure is one of the most important issues in radiation protection. Tissue stem cells have been considered one of the targets of radiation-induced carcinogenesis. There has been a hypothesis that the carcinogenic effects of radiation can be reduced if damaged stem cells are eliminated via stem cell competition between damaged and intact stem cells. This would be particularly effective under very low-dose-rate conditions, where only a few stem cells in a stem cell pool are affected by radiation. In this presentation, I will introduce a simple mathematical model to discuss the influence of stem cell competition on the accumulation of radiation damage and show that the character of damaged cells and the size of the stem cell pool may affect the accumulation of radiation damage. *Please refer to the email to get access to the Zoom meeting room.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

Organ-to-organ two-way coupling contributes to the stabilization of circadian clock in Arabidopsis.

2021年5月20日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

上本 恭平 (京都大学 / 奈良先端科学技術大学院大学)

Circadian clocks increase plant fitness by anticipating periodic environmental changes using unstable temporal information perceived in each tissue/organ. However, little is known about how such local and noisy temporal information regulates global and coordinated plant growth. Here, we show that nutrient-mediated two-way communication between shoots and roots stabilizes circadian rhythms and aids plant growth. The photosynthetic product, sucrose, is transported from the shoot to the root, where it regulates the expression of a clock gene and nutrients uptake rhythms. A lack of nutrient rhythms destabilizes the shoot circadian rhythms and reduces the growth rate. Our mathematical model supports that two-way communication between organs reduces the heterogeneity of the circadian rhythm, thereby maintaining the robustness of the circadian clock in a noisy environment. As with feedback loops in other hierarchies, nutrient-mediated shoot-root interorgan communication of the circadian clock is advantageous for proper growth under fluctuating environmental conditions. *Please refer to the email to get access to the Zoom meeting room.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

Modeling Membrane Morphological Change during Autophagosome Formation

2021年5月14日(金) 10:00 - 11:00

境 祐二 (数理創造プログラム 客員研究員 / 東京大学 大学院医学系研究科 助教)

Membrane-bound organelles compartmentalize eukaryotic cells and adopt various characteristic shapes such as disk-shaped, tubules, spherical vesicles, and their intermediate structures. Organellar morphology is regulated by protein and lipid compositions. Because organellar shape directly relates to organellar function, it is important to understand the mechanisms regulating organelle morphology. In autophagy, the morphologies of the isolation membrane change from disk- to cup-shaped, closed spherical double-membrane structure. Eventually the membrane engulfs the cytoplasmic materials. In this study [1], we investigate the dynamics of the continuous membrane morphological transition in autophagy, which is governed by the spatiotemporal regulation of curvature generators. *Please refer to the email to get access to the Zoom meeting room.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

Kullback-Leibler divergence and stochastic dynamics

2021年5月6日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

入谷 亮介 (数理創造プログラム 研究員)

*Detailed information about the seminar refer to the email.

イベント公式言語: 英語

The rheotaxis mechanism of swimming ciliates

2021年4月22日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

西上 幸範 (北海道大学 電子科学研究所)

The swimming unicellular organisms, which live in freshwater, need to resist currents in the environment. Without this ability, their habitat changes with the flow, and they cannot survive in nature for a long time. It is reported that a kind of swimming microorganism, Paramecium, exhibits upstream swimming in 1904. However, the mechanism of the behavior has been still unclear. To elucidate the mechanism, we observed the behavior of a ciliate in a flow field and performed numerical fluid calculations. My results suggest that the rheotaxis is realized by cell shape and inhibition of ciliary beating near the wall. *Please refer to the email to get access to the Zoom meeting room.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

Liquid condensates in cell nucleus

2021年4月15日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

足立 景亮 (数理創造プログラム 基礎科学特別研究員 / 理化学研究所 生命機能科学研究センター (BDR) 生体非平衡物理学理研白眉研究チーム 基礎科学特別研究員)

I will give a talk in a journal club style. I will introduce recent papers regarding liquid-liquid phase separation in cells. In cell biology, several types of liquid condensates of proteins/RNAs have been found recently. The functions of such condensates and the physical mechanism of controlling the liquid state are intensely discussed. In this talk, I will focus on liquid condensates in the cell nucleus and review recent experimental results. *Please refer to the email to get access to the Zoom meeting room.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

Simple models of cancer growth, MCMC parameter estimation and identifiability

2021年4月8日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

カトゥリン・ボシゥメン (数理創造プログラム 副プログラムディレクター / Professor, Department of Physics, Ryerson University, Canada)

I would like to introduce some basic concepts about (very simple) mathematical model of cancer growth, the basic math behind parameter estimation via Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) based on Bayes' theorem, and the different diagnostics you can use to know if the parameters are correctly estimated. I will use a recent example with cancer data in mice. I think this seminar can be interesting to mathematicians (because of the models and the math behind the parameter estimation, but the math is very basic!), to physicists (especially those that have to do some parameter estimation), and to biologists (the cancer model/data and the parameter estimation). I think it will also be interesting to the information theory and prediction science people. MCMC parameter estimation based on physical models is more valuable in my field than machine learning, so I think those interested in machine learning but maybe are not so familiar with MCMC should join to consider them as an alternative approach in certain contexts. *Please refer to the email to get access to the Zoom meeting room.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

Structural reduction of chemical reaction networks based on topology

2021年4月1日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

広野 雄士 (Junior Research Group Leader/Assistant Professor, Research Division, Asia Pacific Center for Theoretical Physics, Republic of Korea)

Chemical reactions form a complex network in living cells and they play vital roles for physiological functions. An amusing question is how the structure of a reaction network is linked to its chemical functionalities. I’ll talk about a method of the reduction of chemical reaction networks, which is convenient for extracting important substructures. Mathematical concepts such as homology and cohomology groups are found to be useful for characterizing the shapes of reaction networks and for tracking the changes of them under reductions. For a given chemical reaction network, we identify topological conditions on its subnetwork, reduction of which preserves the steady state of the remaining part of the network.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

Evolutionary conservativeness and diversification of cycads: Understanding the evolution of living fossils

2021年3月25日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

ホセ サイード・グティエレス オルテガ (千葉大学 国際未来教育基幹 助教)

The cycads are a lineage of gymnosperms that represent an example of biological stasis success. Despite their early origin in the seed plant evolution, they survived multiple events of mass extinction and could diversify in modern tropical ecosystems during the Cenozoic, especially in countries known for their great biodiversity such as Mexico. What factors have allowed their persistence and diversification despite their conservative nature? I have studied the cycad genus Dioon, a group of 17 species occurring in habitats ranging from tropical forests to arid zones in Mexico and Honduras. Phylogenetic and phylogeographic analyses revealed that the diversification of Dioon has been driven by the long-term process of aridification of Mexico since the Miocene. The lineages that shifted from mesic forests to arid zones show leaf trait variations beneficial against water stress; this feature can be also observed at the inter-population level when comparing mesic versus arid sister pairs. What mechanism allows this aridification-driven diversification? Using population genetics and ecological niche modeling on sister lineage pairs, I have revealed that lineages at arid zones might tolerate arid environments, but within the arid habitat, they retain the same ancestral niche also observed on their mesic sisters. The surrounding areas that are suboptimal for their niches serve as barriers against gene flow: this promotes allopatric speciation. This research has revealed that the mechanism that allows the diversification process in Dioon involves three factors: 1) a habitat shift due to aridification, 2) niche conservatism that facilitates geographic isolation, 3) gaining unique morphological and anatomical features that help to counteract water stress, probably through long-term stabilizing selection. This research highlights the importance of biological conservatism in evolution, and how “living fossils” can still diversify into modern ecosystems.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

Microeconomics of metabolism

2021年3月10日(水) 10:00 - 11:00

山岸 純平 (東京大学 金子研究室)

Metabolic behaviors of proliferating cells are often explained as a rational choice to optimize cellular growth rate. In contrast, microeconomics formulates consumption behaviors as optimization problems of utilities. We pushed beyond this analogy to precisely map metabolism onto the theory of consumer choice. We thereby revealed the correspondence between and a general mechanism for mysteries in biology and economics: the Warburg effect, a seemingly-wasteful but ubiquitous phenomenon where cells favor aerobic glycolysis over more energetically-efficient respiration, and Giffen behavior, the unexpected consumer behavior where a good is demanded more as its price rises. The correspondence implies that respiration is counterintuitively stimulated when its efficiency is decreased by drug administration. This “microeconomics of metabolism” will serve as a macroscopic phenomenology to predict the metabolic responses against environmental operations. In particular, it offers a universal relationship between the metabolic responses against drug administrations and changes in nutrient availability.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

Origin of non-linearity of large deformation on DNA stretched

2021年2月25日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

横田 宏 (数理創造プログラム 特別研究員)

Since DNA in a cell is mechanically stretched or rotated by many proteins, the mechanical response of DNA in vitro is expected to be basic point for understanding its behavior. When DNA is stretched by relatively high force, the length of DNA shows the nonlinear response. In this talk, I introduce the theoretical treatment of DNA stretching in high force region based on polymer physics.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

High-throughput laboratory evolution with machine learning reveals constraints for drug resistance evolution

2021年2月18日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

岩澤 諄一郎 (東京大学 大学院理学系研究科物理学専攻 博士課程)

The understanding of evolution is crucial to tackle the problem of antibiotic resistance which is a growing health concern. Although the lack of sufficient data has long hindered the mechanism of evolution, laboratory evolution experiments equipped with high-throughput sequencing/phenotyping are now gradually changing this situation. The emerging data from recent laboratory evolution experiments have revealed repeatable features in evolutionary processes, suggesting the existence of constraints on evolutionary outcomes [1,2]. Despite its importance for understanding evolution, however, we still lack a systematic investigation for evolutionary constraints. In this seminar, I would like to talk about two projects on the investigation of evolutionary constraints using data acquired from laboratory evolution of Escherichia coli. In the first half, I will explain how to extract an effective latent space for probing constraints in resistance evolution using gene expression data. We will further discuss what kind of structure exists in this space [3]. In the latter half, I will talk about our recent study on how to construct a predictive model for evolution using the information of evolutionary constraints.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

A machine learning approach for prediction of mitochondrial proteins in non-model organisms

2021年2月12日(金) 10:00 - 11:00

久米 慶太郎 (筑波大学 医学医療系 助教)

The evolution of the repertoire of proteins localized to organelles is important for understanding the evolutionary process of organelles. However, experimental methods for identifying organelle-localized proteins have been established only for model organisms and some organisms. Therefore, prediction methods using sequence data obtained from genome and transcriptome analyses, which are relatively easy to obtain, are useful. However, such prediction methods had also been established only for model organisms. In this talk, I will introduce our study in which a machine learning method was used to obtain protein candidates localized to mitochondrion-related organelles in non-model organisms.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

System identification of mechano-chemical epithelial sheet dynamics

2021年2月4日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

浅倉 祥文 (京都大学 大学院生命科学研究科 博士後期課程)

Collective migration of epithelial cells is a fundamental process of multi-cellular organisms. Our recent study using live imaging with FRET-based biosensor discovered that cell migration within an epithelial sheet is oriented by traveling waves of ERK activation. However, it is still elusive how the cells make a decision on migration direction by integrating mechano-chemical signals. Here, we performed reverse-engineering approach to extract a hidden control mechanism in the epithelial sheet dynamics in a data-driven manner. Our model has an ability to forecast cell migration quantified in time-lapse images. Therefore, our approach would be powerful to understand mechano-chemical epithelial sheet dynamics.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語

Numerical inference of the molecular origin of the cyanobacterial circadian rhythm

2021年1月28日(木) 10:00 - 11:00

甲田 信一 (分子科学研究所 計算分子科学研究領域 助教)

The cyanobacterial clock proteins, KaiA, KaiB, and KaiC, are known as the simplest biological clock; Just by mixing them with ATP in a test tube, self-sustaining oscillation with a nearly 24h temperature-compensated period is reconstituted. To elucidate the molecular mechanisms of this oscillator, experimental studies have revealed and investigated in detail various elementary reactions/processes, ranging from local chemical reactions of ligands to global (dis)assembly of the proteins. Yet, proposing molecularly detailed mechanisms of the clock functions is still difficult because almost all experimentally measurable quantities are the results of complicated interplays between many elementary processes, i.e. independent measurement of an elementary process is difficult. In this talk, I will present a numerical approach to obtain the rate constants of the elementary processes from experimental data [1, 2]. First, a reaction model consisting of rate equations of the elementary processes is built. Then, their rate constants and temperature dependence are inferred by simultaneously fitting model outputs to multiple types of experimental data (such as phosphorylation reactions and ATPase activity) at various temperatures. On the basis of the inferred parameter values, we can quantitatively discuss how the clock functions arise from the interplays between elementary processes. As an example, I will present a potential molecular mechanism of the temperature compensation of period.

会場: via Zoom

イベント公式言語: 英語