From Vienna Series in Theoretical Biology
Modeling Biology
Structures, Behaviors, Evolution
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.
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Summary
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).
ContributorsGiorgio A. Ascoli, Chandrajit Bajaj, James P. Collins, Luciano da Fontoura Costa, Kerstin Dautenhahn, Nigel R. Franks, Scott Gilbert, Marta Ibañes Miguez, Juan Carlos Izpisúa-Belmonte, Alexander S. Klyubin, Thomas J. Koehnle, Manfred D. Laubichler, Sabina Leonelli, James A. R. Marshall, George R. McGhee Jr., Gerd B. Müller, Chrystopher L. Nehaniv, Karl J. Niklas, Lars Olsson, Eirikur Palsson, Daniel Polani, Diego Rasskin Gutman, Hans-Jörg Rheinberger, Alexei V. Samsonovich, Jeffrey C. Schank, Harry B. M. Uylings, Jaap van Pelt, Iain Werry
Hardcover
Out of Print ISBN: 9780262122917 408 pp. | 7 in x 9 in 103 fig/13 tbl illus.Paperback
$40.00 X ISBN: 9780262538152 408 pp. | 7 in x 9 in 103 fig/13 tbl illus.Endorsements
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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
