A deterministic map of Waddington's epigenetic landscape for cell fate specification.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The image of the "epigenetic landscape", with a series of branching valleys and ridges depicting stable cellular states and the barriers between those states, has been a popular visual metaphor for cell lineage specification - especially in light of the recent discovery that terminally differentiated adult cells can be reprogrammed into pluripotent stem cells or into alternative cell lineages. However the question of whether the epigenetic landscape can be mapped out quantitatively to provide a predictive model of cellular differentiation remains largely unanswered.

Results

Here we derive a simple deterministic path-integral quasi-potential, based on the kinetic parameters of a gene network regulating cell fate, and show that this quantity is minimized along a tem

SUBMITTER: Bhattacharya S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3213676 | biostudies-literature | 2011 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature