Emergent Properties in Multicellular Organisms

Emergent Properties in Multicellular Organisms

•Multicellular organisms have properties that emerge from the interaction of their cellular components.

•Science traditionally takes a reductionist approach to problem-solving and theory development.

•Systems Biology recognizes the importance of emergent properties and uses inductive thinking.

•Emergent properties can arise from the interaction of genes, enzymes, cells, tissues, organs, and organ systems.

•The properties of a system cannot be predicted by studying its individual parts.

•Emergent properties are simply the result of combining the parts.

•Differentiation involves the expression of certain genes in a cell's genome.

•Not all genes are expressed in all cells, leading to cell specialization.

•Active genes are usually packaged in an expanded and accessible form, while inactive genes are condensed.

•The number of active genes in a cell determines its level of specialization.

•Specialized tissues can develop through cell differentiation in multicellular organisms.

•Humans have 220 distinct highly specialized cell types.