Cell Language Theory, The: Connecting Mind And Matter

Applications of the Cell Language Theory to Biomedical Sciences 293

“6x9” b2861 The Cell Language Theory: Connecting Mind and Matter

The proposed strategy of implementing the Precision Medicine

Initiative (PMI) is based on three components: (i) the cell language-based

model of the living cell, the Bhopalator, and the human body, the

Piscatawaytor (see Section 3.2.20), (ii) the microarray technique for

measuring mRNA levels in cells and tissues (see Section 7.2), and (iii) the

Planckian distribution equation (PDE) (described in Chapter 8) that intro-

duces a new quantitative method for classifying long-tailed histograms of

mRNA levels measured from both normal and diseased cells and tissues.

Since the microarray technique plays a fundamental role not only in the

proposed strategy for implementing PMI, but also in possibly ushering in

a paradigm shift in cell biology and medicine, this method and its implica-

tions in biology are discussed in some detail in the following sections.

7.2 Ribonoscopy

The term “ribonoscopy” was coined in 2012 [25] to indicate the scientific

study of mRNA levels in living cells and tissues measured with DNA

microarrays, in analogy to spectroscopy which is the study of optical

spectra of atoms and molecules using spectrometers [300]. “Ribonoscopy”

is an experimental method by which

We can study living cells using RNA molecules and their copy number

variations as molecular reporters of intracellular events. (7.3)

7.2.1 DNA Microarrays

A microarray consists of a microscopic slide (or its equivalent), about

2 cm by 2 cm in dimension, divided into, typically, 10,000 squares or

spots, to each of which is covalently attached a fragment of DNA (i.e.,

cDNA, or oligonucleotides) that is complementary to a stretch of the

genome encoding an RNA molecule. Thus, using one microarray, it is

possible to measure simultaneously the levels of 10,000 RNA molecules

or more in a biological sample. Before the development of the microarray

technique, it was possible to study only a small number of RNA molecules

at a time. The experimental procedures involved in DNA microarray

measurements are schematically summarized in Figure 7.3 and its legend.

A typical microarray experiment implicates the following steps:

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