Systems understanding of isoprenoid pathway regulation in arabidopsis

Abstract

Recent technological advancement in molecular biosciences makes it possible to study biological processes at the systems level. At present, two main biological systems approaches are recognized: top-down and bottom- up. Top-down approach uses the “omics” data to characterize the system in a comprehensive way. Result of this approach is a topological or phenomenological molecular network. A bottom-up approach, on the contrary, uses an already de fi ned network and kinetic properties of the individual network components to build a model with the predictive value. Systems understanding of plant isoprenoid pathway regulation is at present largely dominated by top-down approaches, as building of a complete dynamic model of isoprenoid pathway regulation requires prior identi fi cation of all elements of the isoprenoid pathway network and an associated regulatory network. In this chapter, an overview is given on the progress in systems biology research on isoprenoid pathway in a model plant Arabidopsis thaliana. First, an overview on existing resources to obtain Arabidopsis isoprenoid pathway gene network is presented. Second, available methods to obtain quantitative “omics” data with the focus on isoprenoid pathway are discussed. And lastly, systems biology approaches and their application to isoprenoid pathway research are shown.