Electronic system for modeling chemical reactions and biochemical processes
AssigneeMassachusetts Institute of Technology
InventorsSoumyajit Mandal, Rahul Sarpeshkar
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A system for modeling chemical reactions using analog or hybrid-analog-digital electronic circuits. The system exploits similarities between the kinetic rates of chemical reaction and the rates governing current flow in electronic devices such as bipolar junction transistors (BJTs) and metal oxide semiconductor field effect transistors (MOSFETs) operating at subthreshold conditions. These devices, which accurately model the stochastics of chemical processes, can be networked into large arrays to model chemical reaction networks, including biochemical reactions and genetic processes such as activation, induction, transcription, and translation.
Claims66
A method for simulating a chemical reaction using an electronic system comprising:
- providing an exponential current-voltage electronic device for modeling a chemical reaction event wherein:
- an electron concentration at an input of the exponential current-voltage electronic device is configured to model a concentration of a reactant in a chemical reaction event and an electron concentration at an output of the exponential current-voltage electronic device is configured to model a concentration of a product in the chemical reaction event;
- a current flow through the exponential current-voltage electronic device is configured to model a rate of the chemical reaction event;
- and
- a voltage applied at a terminal of the exponential current-voltage electronic device is configured to model a free energy difference in the chemical reaction event;
- applying a power characteristic at an input of the exponential current-voltage electronic device;
- measuring a power characteristic at an output of the exponential current-voltage electronic device;
- and
- generating a report indicative of a chemical species concentration from the measured power characteristic.
An electronic system for modeling gene expression comprising:
- an induction module including at least one exponential current-voltage electronic device and configured to receive an input power characteristic indicative of a simulated concentration of a chemical species and simulate an activation of a transcription factor to produce an output power characteristic indicative of a concentration of the active transcription factor;
- and
- a transcription module including at least one exponential current-voltage electronic device and configured to receive the power characteristic indicative of a concentration of a transcription factor and simulate a genetic transcription process to produce an output power characteristic indicative of mRNA concentration.
An electronic system for modeling gene expression comprising:
- an input module configured to receive a power characteristic indicative of a mRNA concentration;
- a protein dynamics module including at least one exponential current-voltage electronic device and configured to receive the power characteristic indicative of mRNA concentration and simulate a genetic process of translation to produce a power characteristic indicative of a protein concentration;
- and
- an output module configured to receive the power characteristic indicative of protein concentration.
An electronic system configured to simulate noise in a biochemical reaction network comprising:
- a current mode integrator configured to receive an input signal;
- a current leakage circuit connected to the current mode integrator and configured to produce a leak current;
- and
- a control feedback circuit connected to the current leakage circuit and configured to pseudo-randomly control the leak current.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.