  In spatially distributed cellular systems, it is often convenient to
represent complicated auxiliary pathways and spatial transport by time-delayed
reaction rates. Furthermore, many of the reactants appear in low numbers
necessitating a probabilistic description. The coupling of delayed rates with
stochastic dynamics leads to a probability conservation equation characterizing
a non-Markovian process. A systematic approximation is derived that
incorporates the effect of delayed rates on the characterization of molecular
noise, valid in the limit of long delay time. By way of a simple example, we
show that delayed reaction dynamics can only increase intrinsic fluctuations
about the steady-state. The method is general enough to accommodate nonlinear
transition rates, allowing characterization of fluctuations around a
delay-induced limit cycle.
