Team:KULeuven/Modeling/Key Antikey
From 2009.igem.org
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Key Lock Antikey
Overview
The Key and Antikey system performs a subtraction of the blue light signal and the vanillin receptor signal. The result controls the vanillin production. The biology behind the subtraction involves the annealing of complementary RNA strands, the Key and the Antikey. This reaction is favoured over the reaction between the Key and the Lock leading to vanillin synthesis. In this way we try to perform the subtraction before inducing production of vanillin.
This biological equivalent of a subtraction can only yield a positive number, so one can only subtract a small from a big amount. Because we can only actively produce vanillin, we have to subtract the measured quantity of vanillin, the amount of anti-key produced by the vanillin receptor from the wanted quantity of vanillin, the amount of key produced by the blue light sensor.
Models
Simulation
Simulations were conducted to investigate the input output behaviour of the key lock system. In the figures that follow time is measured in seconds and quantities in molecules. Because the rate of annihilation of key and anti key is so large only the difference between input and output is investigated.
In the figure below the difference between the input is plotted in red, the amount of unlocked key is represented in green.
Because of the nonlinear relationship between input and (anti)key, the steady state level of key depends on the level of