Hoes does BioModels Database differ from other biological pathway databases?
BioModels Database is not a database of biochemical pathways. The current state of the field of Computational Systems Biology means that these models are largely dominating the resource at the moment, but the scope of BioModels Database itself is larger than just biochemical events. A quantitative model also differs from a pathway in several respects: • A pathway need not contain quantitative information on the amount of objects, their behaviour, nor on their location. • A pathway is static, while a model can be instantiated into dynamic simulations. • A formal model can merge several biochemical reactions into one, or conversely, can contain reactions without counterparts in the corresponding biological context. The purpose is that the simulations performed with the model produce quantitative results commensurate with the available experimental knowledge.
