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Projects 2005

Sponsoring Laboratory/Section:

Mathematical Research Branch
National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK)

Lab Chief:

Arthur Sherman, Ph.D.

Mentors:

Arthur Sherman, Ph.D.
Vipul Periwal, Ph.D.

Contact Information:

e-mail: asherman@nih.gov
phone: (301)496-4325

Laboratory Description and Project area:

What are the key pathways in energy regulation?

Many feedback loops have been suggested in the biomedical literature as crucial or important in energy regulation. How many of these feedback loops are actually qualitatively distinct in their overall effect on the stability of energy regulation? Do the present set of feedback loops and regulatory interactions suffice for stability and robustness? The project that the BESIP intern would undertake would be to mathematically model the proposed regulatory interactions between the gut, the hypothalamus, the adipose organ, the liver and possibly the pancreas, to answer the questions raised above. The simulation should be a powerful and unambiguous check on purportedly new concepts introduced in the biomedical literature, as well as a framework for testing new concepts in a standard and logically rigorous framework.