Characterization of E. coli Gene Regulatory Network and its Topological Enhancement by Edge Rewiring

Abstract

The innate resilience of biological organisms have long inspired the design of robust systems. Gene regulatory network (GRN) is one such biological network which possesses a gamut of topological properties that contribute to its robustness. In this work, we study E. coli GRN as a three-tier topology to characterize such properties and explain why GRN is particularly vulnerable to failure of hub nodes. We also propose an edge rewiring mechanism on existing E. coli GRN topology to strengthen its robustness against hub failure. With extensive experiments on E. coli GRN, we show that its topological properties improve significantly after applying edge rewiring. Finally, we design wireless sensor networks using original and rewired E. coli GRN topologies. Simulation results indicate that rewired GRN has higher packet delivery and lower latency than original GRN.