Turnpike Property in Optimal Microbial Metabolite Production

Abstract We consider the problem of maximization metabolite production in bacterial cells formulated as a dynamical optimal control (DOCP). According to Pontryagin’s maximum principle, solutions are concatenations singular and bang arcs exhibit chattering or Fuller phenomenon, which is problematic for applications. To avoid chattering, we introduce reduced model still biologically relevant retains important structural features original problem. Using combination analytical numerical methods, show that arc dominant studied DOCPs exhibits turnpike property. This property further used order design simple realistic suboptimal strategies.