Systems level modeling of the cell cycle using budding yeast

Proteins involved in the regulation of the cell cycle are highly conserved across all eukaryotes, and so a relatively simple eukaryote such as yeast can provide insight into a variety of cell cycle perturbations including those that occur in human cancer. To date, the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae has provided the largest amount of experimental and modeling data on the progression of the cell cycle, making it a logical choice for in-depth studies of this process. Moreover, the advent of methods for collection of high-throughput genome, transcriptome, and proteome data has provided a means to collect and precisely quantify simultaneous cell cycle gene transcript and protein levels, permitting modeling of the cell cycle on the systems level. With the appropriate mathematical framework and sufficient and accurate data on cell cycle components, it should be possible to create a model of the cell cycle that not only effectively describes its operation, but can also predict responses to perturbations such as variation in protein levels and responses to external stimuli including targeted inhibition by drugs. In this review, we summarize existing data on the yeast cell cycle, proteomics technologies for quantifying cell cycle proteins, and the mathematical frameworks that can integrate this data into representative and effective models. Systems level modeling of the cell cycle will require the integration of high-quality data with the appropriate mathematical framework, which can currently be attained through the combination of dynamic modeling based on proteomics data and using yeast as a model organism.