Think Simulation - Think Experiment: The Virtual Cell Paradigm

The Virtual Cell modeling and simulation framework is the product of interdisciplinary research in biology that applies the diverse strengths and experiences of individuals from engineering, the physical sciences, the biological sciences, and mathematics. A key feature is the separation of layers (core technologies and abstractions) representing biological models, physical mechanisms, geometry, mathematical models and numerical methods. This reduces software complexity, allowing independent development and verification, but most importantly it clarifies the impact of modeling decisions, assumptions, and approximations. The result is a physically consistent, mathematically rigorous, spatial modeling and simulation framework for cell biology. The Virtual Cell has a rich, interactive user interface which connects to remote services providing scalable access to a modeling database and a large dedicated cluster for shared computation and storage. In addition to new modeling capabilities, future developments will emphasize data and tool interoperability, extensibility, and experimentally oriented model analysis tools