The noisy dynamics of cell-fate decision-making Michael Elowitz, Assistant Professor of Biology and Applied Physics; Bren Scholar, Caltech

A fundamental problem in biology is to understand how genetic circuits generate probabilistic choices among possible cellular states in individual cells. I will discuss our recent work analyzing genetic circuit function in individual Bacillus subtilis cells using quantitative time-lapse movies and mathematical modeling. This work reveals the interplay between noise and circuit architecture in cell fate decision-making processes.