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Research

Biological systems - including the simplest cells - exhibit a broad range of functions to thrive in their environment. Research in the Imperial College Centre for Synthetic Biology is focused on the possibility of engineering the underlying biochemical processes to solve many of the challenges facing society, from healthcare to sustainable energy. In particular, we model, analyse, design and build biological and biochemical systems in living cells and/or in cell extracts, both exploring and enhancing the engineering potential of biology.

As part of our research we develop novel methods to accelerate the celebrated Design-Build-Test-Learn synthetic biology cycle. As such research in the Centre for Synthetic Biology highly multi- and interdisciplinary covering computational modelling and machine learning approaches; automated platform development and genetic circuit engineering ; multi-cellular and multi-organismal interactions, including gene drive and genome engineering; metabolic engineering; in vitro/cell-free synthetic biology; engineered phages and directed evolution; and biomimetics, biomaterials and biological engineering.

Publications

Citation

BibTex format

@article{Liu:2020:10.1007/s00253-020-10902-7,
author = {Liu, Y and Su, A and Li, J and Ledesma-Amaro, R and Xu, P and Du, G and Liu, L},
doi = {10.1007/s00253-020-10902-7},
journal = {Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology},
pages = {9095--9108},
title = {Towards next-generation model microorganism chassis for biomanufacturing},
url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00253-020-10902-7},
volume = {104},
year = {2020}
}

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RIS format (EndNote, RefMan)

TY  - JOUR
AB  - Synthetic biology provides powerful tools and novel strategies for designing and modifying microorganisms to function as cell factories for biomanufacturing, which is a promising approach for realizing chemical production in a green and sustainable manner. Recent advances in genetic component design and genome engineering have enabled significant progresses in the field of synthetic biology chassis that have been developed for enzymes or biochemical production based on synthetic biology strategies, with particular reference to model microorganisms, such as Escherichia coli, Bacillus subtilis, Corynebacterium glutamicum, and Saccharomyces cerevisiae. In this review, strategies for engineering four different functional cellular modules which encompass the total process of biomanufacturing are discussed, including expanding the substrate spectrum for substrate uptake modules, refactoring biosynthetic pathways and dynamic regulation for product synthesis modules, balancing energy and redox modules, and cell membrane and cell wall engineering of product storage and secretion modules. Novel strategies of integrating and coordinating different cellular modules aided by synthetic co-culturing of multiple chassis, artificial intelligence–aided data mining for guiding strain development, and the process for designing automatic chassis development via biofoundry are expected to generate next generations of model microorganism chassis for more efficient biomanufacturing.
AU  - Liu,Y
AU  - Su,A
AU  - Li,J
AU  - Ledesma-Amaro,R
AU  - Xu,P
AU  - Du,G
AU  - Liu,L
DO  - 10.1007/s00253-020-10902-7
EP  - 9108
PY  - 2020///
SN  - 0175-7598
SP  - 9095
TI  - Towards next-generation model microorganism chassis for biomanufacturing
T2  - Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00253-020-10902-7
UR  - http://gateway.webofknowledge.com/gateway/Gateway.cgi?GWVersion=2&SrcApp=PARTNER_APP&SrcAuth=LinksAMR&KeyUT=WOS:000572607200001&DestLinkType=FullRecord&DestApp=ALL_WOS&UsrCustomerID=1ba7043ffcc86c417c072aa74d649202
UR  - http://hdl.handle.net/10044/1/83432
VL  - 104
ER  -