The Temperature-Compensated Goodwin Model Simulates Many Circadian Clock Properties

✍ Scribed by Peter Ruoff; Ludger Rensing

• Book ID: 102611363
• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 1996
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 492 KB
• Volume: 179
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0022-5193
• DOI: 10.1006/jtbi.1996.0067

✦ Synopsis

Goodwin's model oscillator, which consists of a negative feedback loop within a single gene expression pathway (1963, 1965), was modified in order to demonstrate temperature compensation, a characteristic property of circadian oscillators. Temperature effects were introduced into the oscillatory mechanism by means of the Arrhenius equation. This term may provide a simplified estimate of the complicated temperature-dependence of actual cellular processes. Temperature compensation within the oscillatory mechanism was achieved by balancing the effects of different temperatures on amplifying processes and on stabilizing processes (antagonistic balance; Ruoff, 1994). Apart from temperature compensation, the modified Goodwin oscillator showed other characteristic properties of circadian clocks including:

(i) temperature entrainment even by temperature cycles of rather low amplitude (1°C), (ii) phase shifts by temperature pulses or steps of different signs (up or down) and different amplitudes, giving rise to phase response curves similar to those reported, for example, in