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Can computers help to explain biology?

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The road leading from computer formalisms to explaining biological function will be difficult, but Roger Brent and Jehoshua Bruck suggest three hopeful paths that could take us closer to this goal.

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Figure 1: Biological systems (right) have similarities and differences to von Neumann computers (left).

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Acknowledgements

We are grateful to L. Lok, K. Tahashashi, D. Endy, O. Resnekov, P. Rabinow, D. Gillespie, M. Cook and M. Riedel for useful discussions and comments on the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. The Molecular Sciences Institute, Berkeley, 94704, California, USA

    Roger Brent

  2. the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, 91125, California, USA

    Jehoshua Bruck

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  1. Roger Brent
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  2. Jehoshua Bruck
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Brent, R., Bruck, J. Can computers help to explain biology?. Nature 440, 416–417 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1038/440416a

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