Biological Engineering

A "how-too" guide for the mathematical modeling of the biochemical processes inherent to life: the phases of cell growth, enzymes and their regulation, genes and genetic regulation, and signal transduction. This text book is intended as a fourth year or graduate studies text for coursework in biological engineering. Biological engineering is distinct from biochemical engineering in that the biological engineer applies engineering principles to understand the inside the living cell and how best to manipulate the cell to optimize production. The biochemical engineer applies engineering principles to manipulate the environment of the cell to optimize produciton. It is assumed that the student will have had introductory courses in cell biology, biochemistry, chemical kinetics, and thermodynamics. This book is meant as an adjunct course of study to those with a biochemical engineering background. The initial four chapters of this text are written by way of reference and review of the information that would have been provided the student in these prerequisite courses. The latter chapters apply and extend mathematical models for the regulation of enzymes, genes, and signal transduction for metabolic engineering of the cell.