Splicing systems on graphs

The notion of splicing systems has been introduced by Tom Head (1987) in order to model the recombinational behaviors of double-stranded DNA molecules under the simultaneous influence of specified classes of restriction enzymes. Yet for modelling complex: (bio)chemical processes of three-dimensional (macro)molecules in the three-dimensional space strings turn out to be more or less inadequate objects. Hence in this paper the author suggests graphs as more suitable objects for modelling such processes and introduces graph splicing systems. An illustrating example from the area of DNA splicing is elaborated in order to show the suitability of the new approach. The author exhibits the relation between regular graph splicing systems on graphs and splicing systems on strings and shows that his new model allows him to describe splicing systems on strings as well as on circular strings within a uniform framework