No Arabic abstract
The fundamental decomposition of a chemical reaction network (also called its $mathscr{F}$-decomposition) is the set of subnetworks generated by the partition of its set of reactions into the fundamental classes introduced by Ji and Feinberg in 2011 as the basis of their higher deficiency algorithm for mass action systems. The first part of this paper studies the properties of the $mathscr{F}$-decomposition, in particular, its independence (i.e., the networks stoichiometric subspace is the direct sum of the subnetworks stoichiometric subspaces) and its incidence-independence (i.e., the image of the networks incidence map is the direct sum of the incidence maps images of the subnetworks). We derive necessary and sufficient conditions for these properties and identify network classes where the $mathscr{F}$-decomposition coincides with other known decompositions. The second part of the paper applies the above-mentioned results to improve the Multistationarity Algorithm for power-law kinetic systems (MSA), a general computational approach that we introduced in previous work. We show that for systems with non-reactant determined interactions but with an independent $mathscr{F}$-decomposition, the transformation to a dynamically equivalent system with reactant-determined interactions -- required in the original MSA -- is not necessary. We illustrate this improvement with the subnetwork of Schmitzs carbon cycle model recently analyzed by Fortun et al.
Absolute concentration robustness (ACR) is a condition wherein a species in a chemical kinetic system possesses the same value for any positive steady state the network may admit regardless of initial conditions. Thus far, results on ACR center on chemical kinetic systems with deficiency one. In this contribution, we use the idea of dynamic equivalence of chemical reaction networks to derive novel results that guarantee ACR for some classes of power law kinetic systems with deficiency zero. Furthermore, using network decomposition, we identify ACR in higher deficiency networks (i.e. deficiency $geq$ 2) by considering the presence of a low deficiency subnetwork with ACR. Network decomposition also enabled us to recognize and define a weaker form of concentration robustness than ACR, which we named as `balanced concentration robustness. Finally, we also discuss and emphasize our view of ACR as a primarily kinetic character rather than a condition that arises from structural sources.
One important question that interests those who work in chemical reaction network theory (CRNT) is this: Does the system obtained from a reaction network admit a positive equilibrium and if it does, can there be more than one within a stoichiometric class? The higher deficiency algorithm (HDA) of Ji and Feinberg provided a method of determining the multistationarity capacity of a CRN with mass action kinetics (MAK). An extension of this, called Multistationarity Algorithm (MSA), recently came into the scene tackling CRNs with power law kinetics (PLK), a kinetic system which is more general (having MAK systems as a special case). For this paper, we provide a computational approach to study the multistationarity feature of reaction networks endowed with kinetics which are non-negative linear combinations of power law functions called poly-PL kinetics (PYK). The idea is to use MSA and combine it with a transformation called STAR-MSC (i.e., $S$-invariant Termwise Addition of Reactions via Maximal Stoichiometric Coefficients) producing PLKs that are dynamically equivalent to PYKs. This leads us to being able to determinine the multistationarity capacity of a much larger class of kinetic systems. We show that if the transformed dynamically equivalent PLK system is multistationary for a stoichiometric class for a set of particular rate constants, then so is its original corresponding PYK system. Moreover, the monostationarity property of the transformed PLK system also implies the monostationarity property of the original PYK system.
This paper studies chemical kinetic systems which decompose into weakly reversible complex factorizable (CF) systems. Among power law kinetic systems, CF systems (denoted as PL-RDK systems) are those where branching reactions of a reactant complex have identical rows in the kinetic order matrix. Mass action and generalized mass action systems (GMAS) are well-known examples. Schmitzs global carbon cycle model is a previously studied non-complex factorizable (NF) power law system (denoted as PL-NDK). We derive novel conditions for the existence of weakly reversible CF-decompositions and present an algorithm for verifying these conditions. We discuss methods for identifying independent decompositions, i.e., those where the stoichiometric subspaces of the subnetworks form a direct sum, as such decompositions relate positive equilibria sets of the subnetworks to that of the whole network. We then use the results to determine the positive equilibria sets of PL-NDK systems which admit an independent weakly reversible decomposition into PL-RDK systems of PLP type, i.e., the positive equilibria are log-parametrized, which is a broad generalization of a Deficiency Zero Theorem of Fortun et al. (2019).
Persistence and permanence are properties of dynamical systems that describe the long-term behavior of the solutions, and in particular specify whether positive solutions approach the boundary of the positive orthant. Mass-action systems (or more generally power-law systems) are very common in chemistry, biology, and engineering, and are often used to describe the dynamics in interaction networks. We prove that two-species mass-action systems derived from weakly reversible networks are both persistent and permanent, for any values of the reaction rate parameters. Moreover, we prove that a larger class of networks, called endotactic networks, also give rise to permanent systems, even if we allow the reaction rate parameters to vary in time. These results also apply to power-law systems and other nonlinear dynamical systems. In addition, ideas behind these results allow us to prove the Global Attractor Conjecture for three-species systems.
A persistent dynamical system in $mathbb{R}^d_{> 0}$ is one whose solutions have positive lower bounds for large $t$, while a permanent dynamical system in $mathbb{R}^d_{> 0}$ is one whose solutions have uniform upper and lower bounds for large $t$. These properties have important applications for the study of mathematical models in biochemistry, cell biology, and ecology. Inspired by reaction network theory, we define a class of polynomial dynamical systems called tropically endotactic. We show that two-dimensional tropically endotactic polynomial dynamical systems are permanent, irrespective of the values of (possibly time-dependent) parameters in these systems. These results generalize the permanence of two-dimensional reversible, weakly reversible, and endotactic mass action systems.