Network

A network is a representation of a system of connected components. The network may be represented as a connected graph, a w:multi-graph, hypergraph, w:colored graph, meta-graph or category, and it has therefore a specific topological structure, or w:topology specified by the connections present between the system components. The behavior(s) of a network is (are), in general, distinct from that of its components, although it is ultimately determined by the interactions between its components. Whereas the network specifying a computer, an automaton, or a machine, or device, is decomposable into certain types of major subnetworks, such as group machines (clocks) and state-permutation modules, bionetworks of highly complex systems such as organisms are not decomposable in this sense into any simpler subnetworks or bio-modules without the loss of essential physiological functions that are characteristic to Life and living organisms.

• The w:genome of a cell can be represented by a genetic network which contains all the genes of the organisms that are functionally, or operationally, linked.
• The w:proteome of a cell is the network of all interacting proteins in a physiologically functional (living) cell.
• The w:neural network of a brain can be represented as a graph of all connected neurons in the brain.

Notes

1. In the beginning, modeling of bionetworks was limited to random network models, and therefore one should carefully consider certain articles on `genetic networks'

to be only random models of the real genome, and therefore, perhaps only metaphors of the latter. similarly, initial models of brain networks that were called `neural networks' were random, and the term has also been extended to "artificial intelligence" (AI) networks that contain electronic circuits rather than real neurons of an organism.

See also

• Computer Networks
• Network Administration