Is SystemC-AMS an appropriate "promoter" for the modeling and simulation of bio-compatible systems?

The paper presents an innovative approach for the modeling and simulation of heterogeneous biological systems based on SystemC-AMS, an open-source C++ extension to the OSCI SystemC Standard. After some basic notions on synthetic biology, an analogy is drawn between this active field of research and nanoelectronics. The paper then presents the SystemC-AMS Timed DataFlow (TDF) modeling formalism used to model these multidomain devices. It also details the presented case study, a bio-compatible system with feedback consisting of a biological sensor instanciating a T flip-flop BioBrick and a EnFET, a voluntarily simple digital processing unit and an actuator based on the Hodgkin-Huxley neuron model. Some simulation results are given that validate the use of SystemC-AMS as an attractive, open-source and flexible framework for modeling complex bio-compatible systems.