Combinatorial complexity is a challenging problem in detailed and mechanistic mathematical modeling of signal transduction. This subject has been discussed intensively and a lot of progress has been made within the last few years. A software tool (BioNetGen) was developed which allows an automatic rule-based set-up of mechanistic model equations. In many cases these models can be reduced by an exact domain-oriented lumping technique. However, the resulting models can still consist of a very large number of differential equations.