title: Suppression of chaos by periodic oscillations in a model for cyclic AMP signalling in Dictyostelium cells.
abstract: We investigate how the introduction of cells oscillating periodically affects the behaviour of a suspension of Dictyostelium discoideum amoebae undergoing chaotic oscillations of cyclic AMP. The analysis of a model indicates that a tiny proportion of periodic cells suffices to transform chaos into periodic oscillations in such suspensions. A similar result is obtained by forcing the aperiodic oscillations by a small-amplitude, periodic input of cyclic AMP. The results provide an explanation for the observation of regular oscillations in suspensions of a putatively chaotic mutant of Dictyostelium discoideum. More generally, the results show how chaos in biological systems may disappear through the coupling with periodic oscillations.
authors.affiliation: Faculté des Sciences, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium.
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Halloy
authors.forename: J L
authors.initials: JL
authors.lastname: Martiel
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Wurster
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Goldbeter
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000242:Cyclic AMP / Q000378:metabolism*; D004023:Dictyostelium / Q000378:metabolism*; D008433:Mathematics; D010507:Periodicity; D015398:Signal Transduction
chemical_list: D000242:Cyclic AMP