A Developmental Image Compression Technique Using Gene Regulatory Networks

Abstract

One of the most fascinating properties of biological development is the fact that large, complex organisms are created using the relatively small amount of information that is encoded in the deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) of a single cell. Once development is initiated, a complex process of gene activity and regulation takes place that triggers a series of cell actions which, over time, create complex, multicellular organisms (Wolpert et al, 2002). During the organism’s lifetime, the developmental process constantly adapts to changing environments and maintains it in the case of damage. Hence, the crucial factor that allows developmental processes to unfold their power is time. From an engineering and computer science point of view, this means that information is encoded in the time steps of the dynamic system represented by the developmental process. In this respect, the DNA represents compressed information, which is expanded during the developmental process and expressed through the various states of the organism.