Challenges Collection
in PLoS Biology
This collection of brief provocative discussion papers, initiated and edited by Simon Levin, aim to highlight fundamental questions in biology that cut across and help unify different biological disciplines.
Look out for new essays being added to this collection.
Series Editor
Simon Levin's interests lie in understanding how macroscopic patterns and processes are maintained at the level of ecosystems and the biosphere. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science and is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Philosophical Society. Among numerous awards, including the MacArthur Award (1988), he has been honored most recently with the Kyoto Prize in Basic Sciences (2005) by the Inamori Foundation and the American Institute of Biological Sciences Distinguished Scientist Award (2007). His website is http://www.eeb.princeton.edu/~slevin/
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Joel Cohen offers a historical and prospective analysis of the relationship between mathematics and biology.
EDITORIAL
Fundamental Questions in BiologySimon A. Levin
The pace of our understanding of biology has engendered increasing specialization but there are still common fundamental challenges that unify biology and should form the core of future research.
ESSAYS
Cooperation among Microorganisms
Wingreen NS, Levin SA
Understanding cooperation among microorganisms presents conceptual and mathematical challenges at the interface of evolutionary biology and the theory of emergent properties of independent agents, two of the most exciting areas in modern mathematical biology.View this author's website
Balancing Robustness and Evolvability
Lenski RE, Barrick JE, Ofria C
Can a single unifying mathematical framework help to explain robustness - the ability of organisms to persist in the face of changing conditions - at all biological scales, from biochemical to ecological?View this author's website
Evolution, Interactions, and Biological NetworksWeitz JS, Benfey PN, Wingreen NS
Shifting the perspective of the questions we ask will ensure that network theory continues to excite the network theorists, but more importantly, that it remains vital to progress in biological research.View this author's website
Environmental shotgun sequencing promises to reveal novel and fundamental insights into the hidden world of microbes, but the complexity of analysis required to realize this potential poses unique interdisciplinary challenges.View this author's website
The Genetics of Brain Wiring; from Molecule to MindMitchell K
What makes some people neurotic or schizophrenic or right-handed or fearless? The challenge in answering this is to map from genotype to anatomical and physiological phenotypes and beyond to behavior and cognition.
View this author's website
Stoichiometry and the New Biology: The Future Is NowElser JJ, Hamilton A
There is a call for biological science to move away from the reductionist focus of the past, but there are large-scale integrative efforts already underway; biological stoichiometry provides one such example. View this author's website
Viral evolution in the genomic ageHolmes, EC
The remarkable increase in the number of viral genome sequences represents both opportunities and challenges for understanding disease ecology and evolution, and must stimulate researchers to address questions that were previously considered out of reach. View this author's website