LSH Seminar Marleen Balvert

Metabolic Network Analysis and Phylogeny

In this lecture I will sketch two subfields of my research in life sciences, that have otherwise little overlap.

First I will show how optimization and enumeration play a role in metabolic network analysis and that mathematics can help solving these problems. In particular I will consider so-called flux balance analysis. This is research that has been done and is going on in collaboration with Marie-France Sagot and Arne Reimers.

Then I will give you an example of my research in phylogeny. In particular I will show you that reticulation events like horizontal gene transfer (especially in lower order organisms) require us to abolish the generically used pedigree tree model, but instead settle for a phylogenetic network. I will give some examples of results that we obtained within this model. This is research in collaboration with Leo van Iersel and Steven Kelk.