Streamlining the E.coli Genetic Code

Scientists design a bacterial genome with only 57 codons.

The genetic code normally contains 64 codons, but researchers from Harvard University and their colleagues have designed an Escherichia coli genome with only 57 codons, replacing the others wholesale. In a paper published today (August 18) in Science, the team describes the computer-generated genome and reports on the first phases of its synthesis in the lab.

“We create something that really pushes the limit of genomes,” study coauthor Nili Ostrov, a postdoc in George Church’s lab at Harvard, told The Scientist. “The idea is that this is completely new, and we’re trying to see if it’s viable.”

In the planned 57-codon E. coli genome, each of the seven deleted codons is exchanged for a synonymous one.

Read more: Streamlining the E.coli Genetic Code

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Source: the-scientist

Synthetic Biology Comes into Its Own

Researchers create novel genetic circuits that give insight into, and are inspired by, nature.

Every two hours in Matthew Bennett’s Rice University lab, cyan and yellow lights flashed in synchronization. Bennett and his team had engineered 12 components to generate the coordinated oscillations. This circuit wasn’t electronic, however; it was biological. Two populations of E. coli, each carrying a synthetic gene circuit, cycled in synchronous pulses every 14 hours.

Bennett’s work, published last year in Science, is a key application of modern synthetic biology: taking biological components and linking them together to form novel functional circuits. Instead of a program coded in Java and executed by a computer’s working memory, commands were written in DNA and carried out by the microbes’ cellular machinery. LEDs were replaced with fluorescent proteins, and molecular signaling cascades served as the system’s wires.

Read more: Synthetic Biology Comes into Its Own

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Source: theScientist