Towards Cytoskeleton Computers. A Proposal

Abstract

We propose a road-map to experimental implementation of cytoskeleton-based computing devices. An overall concept is described in the following.• Collision-based cytoskeleton computers implement logical gates via interactions between travelling localisation (voltage solitons on AF/MT chains and AF/MT polymerisation wave fronts).• Cytoskeleton networks are grown via programmable polymerisation. Data are fed into the AF/MT computing networks via electrical and optical means.• Data signals are travelling localisations (solitons, conformational defects) at the network terminals.• The computation is implemented via collisions between the localisations at structural gates (branching sites) of the AF/MT network.• The results of the computation are recorded electrically and/or optically at the output terminals of the protein networks.• As additional options, optical I/O elements are envisaged via direct excitation of the protein network and by coupling to fluorescent molecules.

On resistance switching and oscillations in tubulin microtubule droplets

“…The framework of the sub-cellular computation was further supported by Priel, Tuszynski and Cantiello in their studies of information processing in actin-tubulin networks of neuron dendrites [45]. The pathways towards development of cytoskeleton based computing devices [4,40,38] have been so far mainly based on theoretical studies and computer modelling. This might be explained by the fact that experimentally-wise it might be difficult to address individual units of tubulin polymers to write and read information arbitrarily.…”

All Wired Up: An Exploration of the Electrical Properties of Microtubules and Tubulin

“…We now know that the electrical behavior (conductivity, surface charge) of free unpolymerized tubulin in solution is dramatically different from that in its polymerized forms. , However, understanding how the electrical properties of free tubulin change as it polymerizes will help reveal how MT length and sheet dimensions control their electrical behavior. Future work showing precisely how actin filaments and TBAs alter MT electrical properties should shed further light on the promise of the cytoskeleton as a tunable, dynamic, and sensitive electromagnetic signal transduction device . Indeed, the effect of MT electromechanical properties at the cellular system level must be explored.…”

Computing on actin bundles network

“…These structures effectively form very stable and long-living 3d networks, which can be readily imaged with confocal LSM and subsequently displayed as 2d structures. Thus, these networks can form a hardware of future cytoskeleton based computers [6].…”