Emergence of motifs in model gene regulatory networks

Gene regulatory networks arise in all living cells, allowing the control of gene expression patterns. The study of their structure has revealed that certain subgraphs of interactions or "motifs" appear at anomalously high frequencies. I ask here whether this phenomenon may emerge because of the functions carried out by these networks. During this talk I will introduce the concept of gene regulation and give examples of important biological processes where interactions between genes play a crucial role. Next, the question of motif emergence will be addressed within a statistical framework which incorporates binding of gene products to DNA. By using Monte Carlo sampling with two biologically motivated functional constraints imposed on gene expression patterns, I will show that different classes of network motifs are found.