SubjectsSubjects(version: 980)
Course, academic year 2021/2022
  
   
Systems Biology - P143002
Title: Systémová biologie
Guaranteed by: Department of Informatics and Chemistry (143)
Faculty: Faculty of Chemical Technology
Actual: from 2020 to 2022
Semester: winter
Points: winter s.:0
E-Credits: winter s.:0
Examination process: winter s.:
Hours per week, examination: winter s.:3/0, other [HT]
Capacity: unlimited / unknown (unknown)
Min. number of students: unlimited
State of the course: taught
Language: Czech
Teaching methods: full-time
Level:  
Note: course is intended for doctoral students only
can be fulfilled in the future
Guarantor: Kolář Michal Mgr. Ph.D.
Classification: Biology > Theoretical Biology
Interchangeability : N143048
Is interchangeable with: AP143002
Examination dates   Schedule   
Annotation -
The aim of the lecture is to provide a first insight into systems biology. We will focus primarily on the structure of regulatory networks, their global properties, and the enrichment of network motifs. Using real examples, we will study frequently recurring motifs, explain their functions, and discuss the reasons why they are evolutionarily conserved. We will examine the mechanisms by which robustness is achieved in these networks and how they are evolutionarily optimized.
Last update: Kolář Michal (12.02.2026)
Course completion requirements -

At the end of the semester, students submit assignments, present a thematically relevant research article, and take a written exam.

Last update: Kolář Michal (12.02.2026)
Literature -

Recommended:

  • Z: Alon, U.: An Introduction to Systems Biology: Design Principles of Biological Circuits (Second edition). CRC Press, Boca Raton, 2020.

Last update: Kolář Michal (12.02.2026)
Syllabus -

1. How cells sense the world: signaling and regulatory networks.

2. Transcription networks and their properties. Network motifs.

3. Autoregulation: how to speed up processes that are too slow.

4. Coherent feed-forward loop: protection against random fluctuations.

5. Incoherent feed-forward loop: rapid response to environmental changes.

6. Regulatory networks in embryonic development: the bistable switch.

7. Neural networks: the multilayer perceptron.

8. Additional network motifs and the global structure of regulatory networks.

9. Robustness of signaling networks: chemotaxis. Robustness in embryonic development. Kinetic proofreading. Dynamic compensation.

10. Optimality of gene circuits and their relationship to biological fitness. The demand rule.

11. Weber’s law and fold-change detection.

Last update: Kolář Michal (12.02.2026)
Learning outcomes -

Students will be able to:

  • characterize basic biological regulatory networks and their network motifs
  • describe the biological reasons leading to the enrichment of specific network motifs (autoregulation, feed-forward loop, etc.)
  • mathematically describe important regulatory motifs and discuss their robustness and optimality

Last update: Kolář Michal (12.02.2026)
Registration requirements -

Biochemistry, Molecular Genetics, Mathematical Analysis

Last update: Kolář Michal (12.02.2026)
 
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