Mathematical and computational models of immune-receptor signalling

The process of signalling through receptors of the immune system involves highly connected networks of interacting components. Understanding the often counter-intuitive behaviour of these networks requires the development of mathematical and computational models. Here, we focus on the application of these models to understand signalling through immune receptors that are involved in antigen recognition. Simple models, which ignore the details of the signalling machinery, have provided considerable insight into how ligand - receptor binding properties affect signalling outcomes. Detailed models, which include specific molecular components and interactions beyond the ligand and receptor, are difficult to develop but have already provided new mechanistic understanding and uncovered relationships that are difficult to detect by experimental observation alone. They offer hope that models might eventually predict the full spectrum of signalling behaviour.