Controllability analysis of transcriptional regulatory networks for Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Structural controllability of complex networks has been a research focus in recent years. However, few works considered the structural controllability of biological networks, especially for dynamic biological networks. In this paper, structural controllability of one static and five dynamic transcriptional regulatory networks (TRNs) for Saccharomyces cerevisiae (S. cerevisiae) have been investigated. The five dynamic networks included two endogenous and three exogenous ones. We clarified the controllability properties of these networks, as well as explored the differences among different types of networks. Our results revealed that the structural properties of different types of networks are significantly different. We found that the TRNs are rather difficult to be fully controlled. However, the dynamic TRNs were relatively easier to be controlled than the static one, and one needs relatively more external inputs to control the exogenous TRNs than the endogenous ones. Based on the structural controllability analysis of subnetworks with the same sizes, as well as randomly perturbed networks by preserving degree distributions, we further illustrated that the structural controllability of the six networks may be mainly dominated by their degree distributions. Our investigations clarify the control properties of TRNs in S. cerevisiae, it provides some insights on real-world control of biological networks.