Information and Noise:
Chemistry, Biology and Evolution
Creating Complex Systems

Beilstein Bozen Symposium 2018

5 – 7 June 2018
Hotel Jagdschloss Niederwald, Rüdesheim, Germany

Scientific Committee:

Lee Cronin / University of Glasgow, UK

Tim Clark / University of Nürnberg-Erlangen

Martin G. Hicks, Carsten Kettner / Beilstein-Institut

 

Aspects covered by this conference

Complex molecules found in nature are the results of chemical reactions in biological systems, i.e. living systems. But what is the maximum complexity that can be found abiotically without the use of a biological system and is there a limit to the complexity that biological systems can produce (or humans can understand)?

Is the chemical variation of life on earth the most robust form potentially evolvable, or just robust enough?

Is it efficient to mimic biological synthesis pathways by means from the organic chemistry toolbox?

Information and Noise:
Chemistry, Biology and Evolution
Creating Complex Systems

When do chemical systems become biological ones? What needs to happen for molecules behaving stochastically to join in networks and cooperate to produce non-random or directed chemical pathways? Biological systems consist of networks of interacting molecules over a large number of time and length scales, and with error tolerance: The larger and more organized the molecules, the more they behave cooperatively. The evolution of biological systems results in interconnected networks optimized for robustness. Such systems are often not the optimal solution, but rather an adjacent one, stable to perturbations. Indeed, before the first genetically regulated ones, such systems had to self-encode into a replicating system. What mechanism led to self-encoding chemistry and was this the seed for biological evolution? This question is perhaps the most important. Finding the first system that is able to evolve is a big challenge.

The first evolving systems started without all the error-correction mechanisms of biology, and chemical reactions do not proceed with 100% yield; they are inherently noisy. Sometimes the reaction produces byproducts, other times, small changes in the conditions lead to changes in products.

Biological systems are also noisy. Noise can be described in terms of apparently undirected activity such as Brownian molecular movement in cells, or even in terms of unspecific, promiscuous enzyme catalysis of chemical reactions involving unusual or uncommon substrates. Information transfer in networks can be facilitated by noise. What is the nature and meaning of the information that we are transferring in chemical and biochemical reactions and what types of noise play a role in signaling and information transfer in biological systems?

Complex molecules found in nature are the results of chemical reactions in biological systems, i.e. living systems. But what is the maximum complexity that can be found abiotically without the use of a biological system and is there a limit to the complexity that biological systems can produce (or humans can understand)? Is the chemical variation of life on earth the most robust form potentially evolvable, or just robust enough? Is it efficient to mimic biological synthesis pathways by means from the organic chemistry toolbox?

Scientific Program

 

Tuesday, 5 June

 

9.00
Opening

Session Chair: Lara K. Mahal

9.20
Information / Matter Interplay Conceals Life's Universal Laws
Antoine Danchin, Institute of Cardiometabolism and Nutrition, Paris, France

10.00
Macromolecular Crowding is an Important Organizing Principle for Chemical Catalysis Inside Biomolecular Condensates
Santiago Schnell, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA

10.40
Oral Poster Session #1

11.00
Coffee Break

11.20
Exploring Transitions in Chemical Complexity
Lee Cronin, University of Glasgow, UK

12.00
Copying vs Self-assembly: What's the Fundamental Difference?

Thomas Ouldridge, Imperial College London, UK

12.40
Lunch

Session Chair: Kepa Ruiz-Mirazo

13.50
Fundamental Limits on the Thermodynamic Costs of Circuits
David Wolpert, Santa Fe Institute, USA

14.30
Semantic Closure Demonstrated by the Evolution of an Universal Constructor Architecture in an Artificial Chemistry
Susan Stepney, University of York, UK

15.10
Oral Poster Session #2

15.30
Tea Break

15.50
Exploring the Diversity and Complexity of Glycans in Nature: Not for the Faint-Hearted
Ajit Varki ,University of California, San Diego, USA

16.30
How do proteins encode their folded structures?  And, how might the folding code have begun?
Ken A. Dill, Stony Brook University, New York, USA

17.10
Break

17.20
Poster Session

19.30
Dinner

 

 

Wednesday, 6 June

 

Session Chair: Susan Stepney

9.00
Fitness Landscapes of an RNA World

Irene Chen, University of California, Santa Barbara, USA

9.40
Synthetic Genetics: beyond DNA and RNA
Philipp Holliger,MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge, UK

10.20
A miRNA-based Approach towards Cracking the Glycocode

Lara K. Mahal, New York University, USA

11.00
Coffee Break

11.20
In Through the Out Door – Creating Responsive, Dynamic Networks Using Synthetic Replicators

Doug Philp, University of St. Andrews, UK

12.00
Natural Heterotic Computing: ROS-driven Evolution of Environmental Bacteria
Victor de Lorenzo, Centro Nacional de Biotecnologia, Madrid, Spain

12.40
Lunch

14.00
Excursion

19.30
Dinner

 

Thursday, 7 June

 

Session Chair: Wilhelm Boland

9.00
Origin and Effects of ‘White Noise’ in Cellular Networks

Stefan T. Arold, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Saudi Arabia

9.40
G-Protein Coupled Receptors Signaling: Noisy Biological Channels?
Tim Clark, Friedrich Alexander University Erlangen-Nürnberg, Germany

10.20
Coffee Break

10.40
Determinism and Contingency Shape Metabolic Innovation During Symbiogenesis

Juli Peretó, Universitat de Valencia, Paterna, Spain

11.20
Systems Biology of Eukaryotic Superorganisms: a Pan-holistic Perspective

Ulrich Kutschera, University of Kassel, Germany

12.00
Lunch

13.30
Creating Evolutionary Feedback Loops

Andrew Ellington, The University of Texas at Austin, USA

14.10
Morphisms of Reaction Networks

Luca Cardelli, Microsoft Research, Cambridge, UK

14.50
Tea Break

15.10
Noise-induced Effects in the Dynamics of Gene Regulatory Networks in Single Cells and Tissues

Ramon Grima, University of Edinburgh, UK

15.50
'Information' as a Principle of Organization for Biology: Reinterpreting the Concept to Understand the Complexity of Living Organisms and their Evolutionary Potential.

Kepa Ruiz-Mirazo, University of the Basque Country, San Sebastian, Spain

16.30
Closing remarks

19.30
Dinner

Photo Gallery