Section: Overall Objectives

Highlights of the Year

• Based on simple microalgae models, optimal operating conditions were theroretically identified for the biomass productivity under day/night cycles using Pontryagin's maximum principle [25] . This results paves the way for the theoretical and numerical development of (near)-optimal control laws for lipid production based on more complex models.

• The dynamical behaviour of biological networks can often be qualitatively described by piecewise affine systems. We developped a probabilistic approach for describing the trajectories and predicting periodic orbits in such models. In the state transition graph, a transition probability between two nodes can be defined in terms of model parameters [22] . This approach could be used for design or control of genetic networks.