Data-driven, data-intensive computing for modelling and analysis of biological networks: application to bioethanol production

Modelling biological networks is inherently data-driven and data-intensive. The combinatorial nature of this type of modelling, however, requires new methods capable of dealing with the enormous size and irregularity of the search. Searching via 'backtracking' is one possible solution that avoids exhaustive searches by constraining the search space to the subspace of feasible solutions. Despite its wide use in many combinatorial optimization problems, there are currently few parallel implementations of backtracking capable of effectively dealing with the memory-intensive nature of the process and the extremely unbalanced loads present. In this paper, a parallel, scalable, and memory-efficient backtracking algorithm within the context of maximal clique enumeration is presented, and its applicability to large-scale biological networks aimed at studying the mechanisms for efficient bioethanol production is discussed.