Generalized Hill Function Method for Modeling Molecular Processes

Development of an in silico cell is an urgent task of systems biology. The core of this cell should consist of mathematical models of intracellular events, including enzymatic reactions and control of gene expression. For example, the minimal model of the E. coli cell should include description of about one thousand enzymatic reactions and regulation of expression of approximately the same number of genes. In many cases detailed mechanisms of molecular processes are not known. In this study, we propose a generalized Hill function method for modeling molecular events. The proposed approach is a method of kinetic data approximation in view of additional data on structure functional features of molecular genetic systems and actually does not demand knowledge of their detailed mechanisms. Generalized Hill function models of an enzymatic reaction catalyzed by the tryptophan-sensitive 3-deoxy-d-arabino-heptulosonate-7-phosphate synthase and the cydAB operon expression regulation are presented.