Paulien Hogeweg (born 1943) is a
Dutch
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* Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands
* Dutch people ()
* Dutch language ()
Dutch may also refer to:
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People E ...
theoretical biologist and
complex system
A complex system is a system composed of many components which may interact with each other. Examples of complex systems are Earth's global climate, organisms, the human brain, infrastructure such as power grid, transportation or communication ...
s researcher studying biological systems as dynamic information processing systems at many interconnected levels. In 1970, together with Ben Hesper, she defined the term
bioinformatics
Bioinformatics () is an interdisciplinary field that develops methods and software tools for understanding biological data, in particular when the data sets are large and complex. As an interdisciplinary field of science, bioinformatics combi ...
as "the study of informatic processes in biotic systems".
Early life and education
Born in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, Hogeweg graduated with a master's degree from the
University of Amsterdam
The University of Amsterdam (abbreviated as UvA, nl, Universiteit van Amsterdam) is a public research university located in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The UvA is one of two large, publicly funded research universities in the city, the other being ...
in 1969. In her last year as Biology Masters Student, Hogeweg published her studies on water plants titled ''Structure of aquatic vegetation: a comparison of aquatic vegetation in India, the Netherlands and Czechoslovakia''. While volunteering at Leiden University, Hogeweg started her study as a Ph.D. student at
Utrecht University
Utrecht University (UU; nl, Universiteit Utrecht, formerly ''Rijksuniversiteit Utrecht'') is a public research university in Utrecht, Netherlands. Established , it is one of the oldest universities in the Netherlands. In 2018, it had an enrollme ...
. She published seven articles based on her Ph.D work. She graduated from
Utrecht University
Utrecht University (UU; nl, Universiteit Utrecht, formerly ''Rijksuniversiteit Utrecht'') is a public research university in Utrecht, Netherlands. Established , it is one of the oldest universities in the Netherlands. In 2018, it had an enrollme ...
in 1976. The title of her thesis is "Topics in Biological Pattern Analysis",
which addressed pattern formation and pattern recognition in biology.
Career
After graduating with a Masters in biology she went to volunteer at a Lab at Leiden University. It was when volunteering at Leiden University that she met Hesper and coined the term Bioinformatics, which she defines as:“the study of information processes in biotic systems.”
[Alejandra Manjarrez. ''“Thinking in the Most Interesting Simplification”'' a conversation with Paulien Hogeweg.] In 1977, Hogeweg opened a research lab dedicated to bioinformatics with Ben Hesper. In 1990, Hogeweg published an important paper in the field of pre-biotic study: ''Spiral wave structure in pre-biotic evolution hypercycle stable against parasites''. In 1991, Hogeweg became a full professor of Theoretical Biology at Utrecht University (UU). Since 2008, Hogeweg has been an Honorary professor at UU. Hogeweg has participated as an editor board member for Journal Theoretical Biology, Bulletin Mathematical Biology, Biosystems, Artificial Life Journal, and Ecological Informatics.
Research
Starting with asynchronous extensions of
L-system
An L-system or Lindenmayer system is a parallel rewriting system and a type of formal grammar. An L-system consists of an alphabet of symbols that can be used to make strings, a collection of production rules that expand each symbol into som ...
s she pioneered
agent-based modeling studying development of social structure in animal societies, using the opportunity based "ToDo" principle where agents "do what there is to do", and a "DoDom" principle for dominance ranking, also known as the winner-loser effect. This type of research later became popular in
artificial life
Artificial life (often abbreviated ALife or A-Life) is a field of study wherein researchers examine systems related to natural life, its processes, and its evolution, through the use of simulations with computer models, robotics, and biochemistry ...
.
When the first biological sequence data became available (from the
EMBL) she developed a tree based algorithm for multiple sequence alignment.
which is now common practice in sequence alignment and phylogeny. At about the same time she pioneered folding algorithms for predicting RNA secondary structures. RNA folding was also introduced to allow for a non-linear genotype to phenotype mapping to study evolution on complex
fitness landscape
Fitness may refer to:
* Physical fitness, a state of health and well-being of the body
* Fitness (biology), an individual's ability to propagate its genes
* Fitness (cereal), a brand of breakfast cereals and granola bars
* ''Fitness'' (magazine), ...
s .
The first phase-phase trajectory of a
chaotic attractor
In the mathematical field of dynamical systems, an attractor is a set of states toward which a system tends to evolve, for a wide variety of starting conditions of the system. System values that get close enough to the attractor values remain ...
in an ecological food-chain model of three differential equations appeared long before chaos became popular. She pioneered the use of
cellular automata
A cellular automaton (pl. cellular automata, abbrev. CA) is a discrete model of computation studied in automata theory. Cellular automata are also called cellular spaces, tessellation automata, homogeneous structures, cellular structures, tessel ...
for studying spatial
ecological
Ecology () is the study of the relationships between living organisms, including humans, and their physical environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community, ecosystem, and biosphere level. Ecology overlaps wi ...
and
evolutionary
Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...
processes and demonstrated that spatial
pattern formation
The science of pattern formation deals with the visible, ( statistically) orderly outcomes of self-organization and the common principles behind similar patterns in nature.
In developmental biology, pattern formation refers to the generation of ...
can revert evolutionary selection pressures.
Extending the
Cellular Potts model
In computational biology, a Cellular Potts model (CPM, also known as the Glazier-Graner-Hogeweg model) is a computational model of cells and tissues. It is used to simulate individual and collective cell behavior, tissue morphogenesis and cancer de ...
(CPM) to study morphogenesis and development she modeled the complete life cycle of
Dictyostelium discoideum
''Dictyostelium discoideum'' is a species of soil-dwelling amoeba belonging to the phylum Amoebozoa, infraphylum Mycetozoa. Commonly referred to as slime mold, ''D. discoideum'' is a eukaryote that transitions from a collection of unicellular ...
using simple rules for chemotaxis and differential adhesion . This CPM approach is now used for modeling in various areas of developmental biology, and the migration of immune cells in lymphoid tissues. Finally the CPM is used for
EvoDevo research.
In recent years, Hogeweg has continued her research on co-evolutionary dynamics and morphogenesis, to expand on “adaptive genomics” and to study the interface between gene regulation and evolution in cellular organisms. Also, her research is focused on evolvability at the level of genome organization and regulatory networks, and has shown RNA increase in complexity as the result of interactions of secondary structure and spatial pattern formation.
Collaborations
Hogeweg has participated in diverse research groups in biological science. Her contribution varies from developing computational methods such as algorithm for tree based multiple sequence alignment which has become a standard practice. Most importantly, her work has greatly contributed to bioinformatics theory.
References
External links
Official websiteTheoretical Biology and Bioinformatics Group, Utrecht University
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hogeweg, Paulien
1943 births
Living people
Dutch women scientists
Dutch biologists
Network scientists