"In a breakthrough effort for computational biology, the world's first complete computer model of an organism has been completed, Stanford researchers reported in the journal Cell. (...) By encompassing the entirety of an organism in silicon, the paper fulfills a longstanding goal for the field. Not only does the model allow researchers to address questions that aren't practical to examine otherwise, it represents a stepping-stone toward the use of computer-aided design in bioengineering and medicine. "This achievement demonstrates a transforming approach to answering questions about fundamental biological processes," (...) "You don't really understand how something works until you can reproduce it yourself." (...)" - Amira

"Even at this small scale, the quantity of data that the Stanford researchers incorporated into the virtual cell's code was enormous. The final model made use of more than 1,900 experimentally determined parameters. To integrate these disparate data points into a unified machine, the researchers modeled individual biological processes as 28 separate "modules," each governed by its own algorithm. These modules then communicated to each other after every time step, making for a unified whole that closely matched M. genitalium's real-world behavior. (...) "This is potentially the new Human Genome Project," Karr said. "It's going to take a really large community effort to get close to a human model." - Amira