Environmental versatility promotes modularity in genome-scale metabolic networks
2011
Environmental versatility promotes modularity in genome-scale metabolic networks
Sample size: 1000
publication
10 minutes
Evidence: high
Author Information
Author(s): Samal Areejit, Wagner Andreas, Martin Olivier C
Hypothesis
Does metabolic versatility affect the modularity of metabolic networks?
Conclusion
Highly versatile metabolic networks are also highly modular, containing more modules and reactions organized into modules.
Supporting Evidence
- Highly versatile networks contain more modules and more reactions organized into modules.
- Modularity in metabolic networks can be a by-product of functional constraints.
- E. coli's metabolism is significantly more modular than the most versatile networks studied.
Takeaway
The more environments a metabolic network can survive in, the more organized and modular it becomes.
Methodology
The study used flux balance analysis and Markov Chain Monte Carlo sampling to analyze metabolic networks.
Limitations
The study focused on a limited number of environments and may not capture all metabolic network behaviors.
Statistical Information
P-Value
0.028
Statistical Significance
p<0.001
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
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