Sloppy Models

Sloppy models are multiparameter models, whose behavior depends only on a few stiff combinations of parameters, with many sloppy parameter directions largely unimportant for model predictions. We've found them ubiquitous in systems biology, in physics and in mathematics.

Sloppy models, Information geometry, and Why Science Works

About Sloppy Models

• A sloppy systems biology model
• What is Sloppiness?
• What are Sloppy Models?
• Fitting Exponentials: Prediction without parameters
• Fitting Polynomials: Where is sloppiness from?
• Why sloppiness? The Sloppy Universality Class
• Differential Geometry and Sloppy Models (Transtrum)
  • The Model Manifold and Hyperribbons (Transtrum)
  • Sloppy Curvature (Transtrum)
• Why is science possible? Sloppy models in Physics.
  • Jessie Silverberg's Huffington Post article and Katheryn McGill's vlog Interview from The Physics Factor.
  • Unedited workshop interview by Steven Reiner, Stony Brook School of Journalism; Mobile version.
  • News article on our paper showing physics is sloppy too

Sloppy model applications

• Do parameters matter? Fits versus measurements.
• Experimental design in sloppy systems
• Robustness and sloppiness
  • Parameter robustness and sloppiness
  • Environmental robustness and sloppiness: Circadian rhythms
  • Evolvability, robustness, and sloppiness
  • Paper: "Sloppiness, robustness, and evolvability in systems biology." Bryan C. Daniels, Yan-Jiun Chen, James P. Sethna, Ryan N. Gutenkunst, and Christopher R. Myers, Current Opinions in Biotechnology (2008), doi:10.1016/j.copbio.2008.06.008, pdf, and supplemental material.
  • Code and data for models used in the paper:
    • KaiC phosphorylation subnetwork
    • NGF/EGF signaling through Erk in PC12 cells and Supplemental material
    • Segment polarity model
• Estimating systematic errors for interatomic potentials and for density functional theory.
• Learning digits with InPCA
• Visualizing the learning trajectories of deep neural networks using InPCA

Sloppy Cell

• Available on SourceForge.
• Older information.

Published Models

• NGF/EGF signaling through Erk
• EGF receptor trafficking

Older, unpublished models

• Quorum sensing
• Circadian rhythms
• G protein-coupled receptor activation

Data base of sloppy spectra

Partial reference list

This work supported by the Division of Materials Research of the U.S. National Science Foundation, through grant DMR-070167 and formerly DMR-0218475.

Statistical Mechanics: Entropy, Order Parameters, and Complexity, now available at Oxford University Press (USA, Europe).