In biochemical dynamical systems during each transition between periodical behaviors, all metabolic intermediaries of the system oscillate with the same frequency but with different phase-shifts. We have studied the behavior of phase-shift records obtained from random transitions between periodic solutions of a biochemical dynamical system. The phase-shift data were analyzed by means of Hurst's rescaled range method (introduced by Mandelbrot and Wallis). The results show the existence of persistent behavior: each value of the phase-shift depends not only on the recent transitions, but also on previous ones. In this paper, the different kind of periodic solutions were determined by different small values of the control parameter. It was assessed the significance of this results through extensive Monte Carlo simulations as well as quantifying the long-range correlations. We have also applied this type of analysis on cardiac rhythms, showing a clear persistent behavior. The relationship of the results with the cellular persistence phenomena conditioned by the past, widely evidenced in experimental observations, is discussed.
Computer-aided phase-shift mask design with reduced complexity
