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Title: A Metric to Quantify Subjective Information in Biological Gradient Sensing
Information theory has been successfully applied to biology with interesting results and applications, ranging from scientific discovery, to system modeling, and engineering. Novel concepts such as semantic and useful information have been proposed to address the peculiarity of biological systems in contrast to Shannon’s classical theory. In this paper, the concept of subjective information, previously observed as an emergent property in a simulated biological system with determinate char- acteristics, is further explored through the proposal of a novel metric for its quantification. This measure is based on a biological system’s ability to dynamically sense and react to environmental signals to achieve a goal. The novel metric is validated through the simulation of a computational model that enables its correlation with different strategies for information acquisition from the environment and processing. The obtained results indicate that the proposed measure of subjective information is reliable in quantifying the effectiveness of a biological system’s strategy in using information from the environment for its growth and survival.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
1816969
PAR ID:
10488362
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ;
Publisher / Repository:
IEEE
Date Published:
Journal Name:
GLOBECOM 2023 - 2023 IEEE Global Communications Conference
Page Range / eLocation ID:
571-576
Subject(s) / Keyword(s):
Information theory, computational simulation of biological cells, chemical reception, mutual information, semantic information, chemotaxis
Format(s):
Medium: X
Location:
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
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