Systems Biology of Metabolism

This lecture introduces Systems Biology, focusing on the holistic view of biological processes and the use of computational and mathematical models to study complex biological systems. It covers topics such as metabolic pathways, genome-scale metabolic models, functional genome annotation, and the semi-automated reconstruction of Genome-scale Metabolic Models (GEMs). The lecture also discusses the application of GEMs, including Flux Balance Analysis (FBA) and in silico gene essentiality studies. Furthermore, it explores the challenges in filling knowledge gaps in metabolism, such as unknown gene functions and enzyme promiscuity, and presents tools like BNICE.ch for predictive biochemistry. The lecture concludes with the potential of Systems Biology and metabolic engineering in bioproduction.