中国物理B ›› 2009, Vol. 18 ›› Issue (3): 1294-1300.doi: 10.1088/1674-1056/18/3/076

• 8000 CROSSDISCIPLINARY PHYSICS AND RELATED AREAS OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY • 上一篇    

Modeling of intercellular synchronization in the Drosophila circadian clock

王军威, 陈爱敏, 张家军, 苑占江, 周天寿   

  1. School of Mathematics and Computational Science, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou 510275, China
  • 收稿日期:2008-08-19 修回日期:2008-09-08 出版日期:2009-03-20 发布日期:2009-03-20
  • 基金资助:
    Project supported by the State Key Program of National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No 60736028), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos 60704045 and 10871074), and Research Fund for the Doctoral Program of Higher Educat

Modeling of intercellular synchronization in the Drosophila circadian clock

Wang Jun-Wei(王军威), Chen Ai-Min(陈爱敏), Zhang Jia-Jun(张家军), Yuan Zhan-Jiang(苑占江), and Zhou Tian-Shou(周天寿)†   

  1. School of Mathematics and Computational Science, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou 510275, China
  • Received:2008-08-19 Revised:2008-09-08 Online:2009-03-20 Published:2009-03-20
  • Supported by:
    Project supported by the State Key Program of National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No 60736028), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos 60704045 and 10871074), and Research Fund for the Doctoral Program of Higher Educat

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摘要： In circadian rhythm generation, intercellular signaling factors are shown to play a crucial role in both sustaining intrinsic cellular rhythmicity and acquiring collective behaviours across a population of circadian neurons. However, the physical mechanism behind their role remains to be fully understood. In this paper, we propose an indirectly coupled multicellular model for the synchronization of Drosophila circadian oscillators combining both intracellular and intercellular dynamics. By simulating different experimental conditions, we find that such an indirect coupling way can synchronize both heterogeneous self-sustained circadian neurons and heterogeneous mutational damped circadian neurons. Moreover, they can also be entrained to ambient light--dark (LD) cycles depending on intercellular signaling.

Abstract: In circadian rhythm generation, intercellular signaling factors are shown to play a crucial role in both sustaining intrinsic cellular rhythmicity and acquiring collective behaviours across a population of circadian neurons. However, the physical mechanism behind their role remains to be fully understood. In this paper, we propose an indirectly coupled multicellular model for the synchronization of Drosophila circadian oscillators combining both intracellular and intercellular dynamics. By simulating different experimental conditions, we find that such an indirect coupling way can synchronize both heterogeneous self-sustained circadian neurons and heterogeneous mutational damped circadian neurons. Moreover, they can also be entrained to ambient light--dark (LD) cycles depending on intercellular signaling.

Key words: Drosophila, biological clock, circadian oscillation, synchronization

中图分类号: 

  • 87.50.W-
87.19.L- (Neuroscience) 87.10.-e (General theory and mathematical aspects) 87.18.-h (Biological complexity)