Modeling Biology: Structures, Behaviors, Evolution (Vienna Series in Theoretical Biology) - Hardcover

9780262122917: Modeling Biology: Structures, Behaviors, Evolution (Vienna Series in Theoretical Biology)

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 026212291X ISBN 13: 9780262122917

Publisher: Mit Pr, 2007

Experts examine new modeling strategies for the interpretation of biological data and their integration into the conceptual framework of theoretical biology, detailing approaches that focus on morphology, development, behavior, or evolution.

Abstract and conceptual models have become an indispensable tool for analyzing the flood of highly detailed empirical data generated in recent years by advanced techniques in the biosciences. Scientists are developing new modeling strategies for analyzing data, integrating results into the conceptual framework of theoretical biology, and formulating new hypotheses. In Modeling Biology, leading scholars investigate new modeling strategies in the domains of morphology, development, behavior, and evolution. The emphasis on models in the biological sciences has been accompanied by a new focus on conceptual issues and a more complex understanding of epistemological concepts. Contributors to Modeling Biology discuss models and modeling strategies from the perspectives of philosophy, history, and applied mathematics. Individual chapters discuss specific approaches to modeling in such domains as biological form, development, and behavior. Finally, the book addresses the modeling of these properties in the context of evolution, with a particular emphasis on the emerging field of evolutionary developmental biology (or evo-devo).

Contributors
Giorgio A. Ascoli, Chandrajit Bajaj, James P. Collins, Luciano da Fontoura Costa, Kerstin Dautenhahn, Nigel R. Franks, Scott Gilbert, Marta Iba�es Miguez, Juan Carlos Izpis�a-Belmonte, Alexander S. Klyubin, Thomas J. Koehnle, Manfred D. Laubichler, Sabina Leonelli, James A. R. Marshall, George R. McGhee Jr., Gerd B. M�ller, Chrystopher L. Nehaniv, Karl J. Niklas, Lars Olsson, Eirikur Palsson, Daniel Polani, Diego Rasskin Gutman, Hans-J�rg Rheinberger, Alexei V. Samsonovich, Jeffrey C. Schank, Harry B. M. Uylings, Jaap van Pelt, Iain Werry

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About the Author:

Manfred D. Laubichler is Professor of Theoretical Biology and History of Biology and Affiliated Professor of Philosophy at the School of Life Sciences and Centers for Biology and Society and Social Dynamics and Complexity at Arizona State University.He is the coeditor of From Embryology to Evo-Devo (MIT Press, 2007).

Review:

Modeling Biology explores the epistemic role of a wide variety of models and modeling practices in contemporary biology. Using examples from current research in morphology, development, behavior, and evolution, the contributors offer critical reflections on the intricate interplay of experiment and model-building, as creative imaginations equipped with the power of modern computing search for the patterns that underlie and inform the complex variety of the living world. In a nice twist, the authors show how models have grown and evolved with their subjects, thus taking on their own form of life.

―Michael S. Mahoney, Program in History of Science, Princeton University

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