Biochemical oscillations are ubiquitous in living organisms. In an autonomous system, not influenced by an external signal, they can only occur out of equilibrium. We show that they emerge through a generic nonequilibrium phase transition, with a characteristic qualitative behavior at criticality. The control parameter is the thermodynamic force which must be above a certain threshold for the onset of biochemical oscillations. This critical behavior is characterized by the thermodynamic flux associated with the thermodynamic force, its diffusion coefficient, and the stationary distribution of the oscillating chemical species. We discuss metrics for the precision of biochemical oscillations by comparing two observables, the Fano factor associated with the thermodynamic flux and the number of coherent oscillations. Since the Fano factor can be small even when there are no biochemical oscillations, we argue that the number of coherent oscillations is more appropriate to quantify the precision of biochemical oscillations. Our results are obtained with three thermodynamically consistent versions of known models: the Brusselator, the activator-inhibitor model, and a model for KaiC oscillations.
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28 July 2018
Research Article|
July 23 2018
Phase transition in thermodynamically consistent biochemical oscillators
Basile Nguyen
;
Basile Nguyen
1
II. Institut für Theoretische Physik, Universität Stuttgart
, 70550 Stuttgart, Germany
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Udo Seifert;
Udo Seifert
1
II. Institut für Theoretische Physik, Universität Stuttgart
, 70550 Stuttgart, Germany
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Andre C. Barato
Andre C. Barato
2
Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems
, Nöthnizer Strasse 38, 01187 Dresden, Germany
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1
II. Institut für Theoretische Physik, Universität Stuttgart
, 70550 Stuttgart, Germany
2
Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems
, Nöthnizer Strasse 38, 01187 Dresden, Germany
J. Chem. Phys. 149, 045101 (2018)
Article history
Received:
April 02 2018
Accepted:
July 01 2018
Citation
Basile Nguyen, Udo Seifert, Andre C. Barato; Phase transition in thermodynamically consistent biochemical oscillators. J. Chem. Phys. 28 July 2018; 149 (4): 045101. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5032104
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