Importance
Applying mathematics to biology has a long history, but only recently has there been an explosion of interest in the field. Some reasons for this include:
- the explosion of data-rich information sets, due to the genomics revolution, which are difficult to understand without the use of analytical tools,
- recent development of mathematical tools such as chaos theory to help understand complex, non-linear mechanisms in biology,
- an increase in computing power which enables calculations and simulations to be performed that were not previously possible, and
- an increasing interest in in silico experimentation due to ethical considerations, risk, unreliability and other complications involved in human and animal research.
Read more about this topic: Algebraic Biology
Famous quotes containing the word importance:
“There are secret articles in our treaties with the gods, of more importance than all the rest, which the historian can never know.”
—Henry David Thoreau (18171862)
“When we can begin to take our failures nonseriously, it means we are ceasing to be afraid of them. It is of immense importance to learn to laugh at ourselves.”
—Katherine Mansfield (18881923)
“Shall we then judge a country by the majority, or by the minority? By the minority, surely. Tis pedantry to estimate nations by the census, or by square miles of land, or other than by their importance to the mind of the time.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (18031882)