Platform

  • Search
  • Seminars
  • Conferences
  • Jobs

Resources

  • Submit Content
  • About Us

© 2025 World Wide

Open knowledge for all • Started with World Wide Neuro • A 501(c)(3) Non-Profit Organization

Analytics consent required

World Wide relies on analytics signals to operate securely and keep research services available. Accept to continue, or leave the site.

Review the Privacy Policy for details about analytics processing.

World Wide
SeminarsConferencesWorkshopsCoursesJobsMapsFeedLibrary
← Back

Biology Messy So How

Back to SeminarsBack
Seminar✓ Recording AvailablePhysics of Life

Biology is “messy”. So how can we take theory in biology seriously and plot predictions and experiments on the same axes?

Workshop, Multiple Speakers

Emory University

Schedule
Thursday, September 24, 2020

Showing your local timezone

Schedule

Thursday, September 24, 2020

12:00 AM America/New_York

Watch recording
Host: Emory TMLS

Seminar location

Seminar location

Not provided

No geocoded details are available for this content yet.

Watch the seminar

Recording provided by the organiser.

Event Information

Format

Recorded Seminar

Recording

Available

Host

Emory TMLS

Duration

70.00 minutes

Seminar location

Seminar location

Not provided

No geocoded details are available for this content yet.

World Wide map

Abstract

Many of us came to biology from physics. There we have been trained on such classic examples as muon g-2, where experimental data and theoretical predictions agree to many significant digits. Now, working in biology, we routinely hear that it is messy, most details matter, and that the best hope for theory in biology is to be semi-qualitative, predict general trends, and to forgo the hope of ever making quantitative predictions with the precision that we are used to in physics. Colloquially, we should be satisfied even if data and models differ so much that plotting them on the same plot makes little sense. However, some of us won’t be satisfied by this. So can we take theory in biology seriously and predict experimental outcomes within (small) error bars? Certainly, we won’t be able to predict everything, but this is never required, even in traditional physics. But we should be able to choose some features of data that are nontrivial and interesting, and focus on them. We also should be able to find different classes of models --- maybe even null models --- that match biology better, and thus allow for a better agreement. It is even possible that large-dimensional datasets of modern high-throughput experiments, and the ensuing “more is different” statistical physics style models will make quantitative, precise theory easier. To explore the role of quantitative theory in biology, in this workshop, eight speakers will address some of the following general questions based on their specific work in different corners of biology: Which features of biological data are predictable? Which types of models are best suited to making quantitative predictions in different fields? Should theorists interested in quantitative predictions focus on different questions, not typically asked by biologists? Do large, multidimensional datasets make theories (and which theories?) more or less likely to succeed? This will be an unapologetically theoretical physics workshop — we won’t focus on a specific subfield of biology, but will explore these questions across the fields, hoping that the underlying theoretical frameworks will help us find the missing connections.

Topics

biological dataerror barsexperimental outcomeshigh-throughput experimentsmodelsnull modelsquantitative predictionsstatistical physicstheoretical biophysicstheory in biology

About the Speaker

Workshop, Multiple Speakers

Emory University

Contact & Resources

Personal Website

livingtheory.emory.edu/programs/conferences-symposiums.html

@EmoryTMLS

Follow on Twitter/X

twitter.com/EmoryTMLS

Related Seminars

Seminar42% match - Relevant

Rethinking Attention: Dynamic Prioritization

neuro

Decades of research on understanding the mechanisms of attentional selection have focused on identifying the units (representations) on which attention operates in order to guide prioritized sensory p

Jan 6, 2025
George Washington University
Seminar42% match - Relevant

The Cognitive Roots of the Problem of Free Will

neuro

Jan 7, 2025
Bielefeld & Amsterdam
Seminar42% match - Relevant

Memory Colloquium Lecture

neuro

Jan 8, 2025
Keio University, Tokyo
World Wide calendar

World Wide highlights

December 2025 • Syncing the latest schedule.

View full calendar
Awaiting featured picks
Month at a glance

Upcoming highlights