The development of systemic approaches in biology has put emphasis on
identifying genetic modules whose behavior can be modeled accurately so as to
gain insight into their structure and function. However most gene circuits in a
cell are under control of external signals and thus quantitative agreement
between experimental data and a mathematical model is difficult. Circadian
biology has been one notable exception: quantitative models of the internal
clock that orchestrates biological processes over the 24-hour diurnal cycle
have been constructed for a few organisms, from cyanobacteria to plants and
mammals. In most cases, a complex architecture with interlocked feedback loops
has been evidenced. Here we present first modeling results for the circadian
clock of the green unicellular alga Ostreococcus tauri. Two plant-like clock
genes have been shown to play a central role in Ostreococcus clock. We find
that their expression time profiles can be accurately reproduced by a minimal
model of a two-gene transcriptional feedback loop. Remarkably, best adjustment
of data recorded under light/dark alternation is obtained when assuming that
the oscillator is not coupled to the diurnal cycle. This suggests that coupling
to light is confined to specific time intervals and has no dynamical effect
when the oscillator is entrained by the diurnal cycle. This intringuing
property may reflect a strategy to minimize the impact of fluctuations in
daylight intensity on the core circadian oscillator, a type of perturbation
that has been rarely considered when assessing the robustness of circadian
clocks
