Single-cell behavior and population heterogeneity: Solving an inverse problem to compute the intrinsic physiological state functions

► Cell population balance models and intrinsic physiological state functions (IPSF). ► An inverse problem must be solved to compute IPSF from phenotypic distribution data. ► We develop and test a robust computational method to accurately solve this problem. ► We compute the IPSF of E. coli populations carrying a toggle network to validate it.