Information theory of molecular communication: directions and challenges

TLDR

Molecular communication uses molecules to carry information and is widely employed by biological cells, attracting interdisciplinary study from biologists, communication theorists, and information theorists. This paper aims to bring molecular communication to the attention of information theorists. The authors highlight the unique mathematical challenges of determining molecular channel capacity and review existing literature on information‑theoretic techniques applied to MC. They propose a concrete information‑theoretic problem inspired by their analysis of molecular communication.

Abstract

Molecular communication (MC) is a communication strategy that uses molecules as carriers of information, and is widely used by biological cells. As an interdisciplinary topic, it has been studied by biologists, communication theorists and a growing number of information theorists. This paper aims to specifically bring MC to the attention of information theorists. To do this, we first highlight the unique mathematical challenges of studying the capacity of molecular channels. Addressing these problems requires use of known, or development of new mathematical tools. Toward this goal, we review a subjective selection of the existing literature on information theoretic aspect of MC The emphasis here is on the mathematical techniques used, rather than on the setup or modeling of a specific paper. Finally, as an example, we propose a concrete information theoretic problem that was motivated by our study of MC.