title: Theoretical aspects of cellular decision-making and information-processing.
abstract: Microscopic biological processes have extraordinary complexity and variety at the sub-cellular, intra-cellular, and multi-cellular levels. In dealing with such complex phenomena, conceptual and theoretical frameworks are crucial, which enable us to understand seemingly different intra- and inter-cellular phenomena from unified viewpoints. Decision-making is one such concept that has attracted much attention recently. Since a number of cellular behavior can be regarded as processes to make specific actions in response to external stimuli, decision-making can cover and has been used to explain a broad range of different cellular phenomena [Balázsi et al. (Cell 144(6):910, 2011), Zeng et al. (Cell 141(4):682, 2010)]. Decision-making is also closely related to cellular information-processing because appropriate decisions cannot be made without exploiting the information that the external stimuli contain. Efficiency of information transduction and processing by intra-cellular networks determines the amount of information obtained, which in turn limits the efficiency of subsequent decision-making. Furthermore, information-processing itself can serve as another concept that is crucial for understanding of other biological processes than decision-making. In this work, we review recent theoretical developments on cellular decision-making and information-processing by focusing on the relation between these two concepts.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Industrial Science, The University of Tokyo, 4-6-1, Komaba, Meguro-ku, Tokyo 153-8505, Japan. tetsuya@mail.crmind.net
authors.forename: Tetsuya J
authors.initials: TJ
authors.lastname: Kobayashi
authors.forename: Atsushi
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Kamimura
mesh_terms: D000222:Adaptation, Physiological / Q000502:physiology; D000465:Algorithms; D000818:Animals; D017209:Apoptosis / Q000502:physiology*; D002454:Cell Differentiation / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008954:Models, Biological; D015398:Signal Transduction / Q000502:physiology*