AVS 62nd International Symposium & Exhibition
    IPF on Mesoscale Science and Technology of Materials and Metamaterials Monday Sessions
       Session IPF+MS-MoM

Invited Paper IPF+MS-MoM8
The Convergence of Synthetic Biology and Biofabrication: Guiding Biological Function at the Mesoscale

Monday, October 19, 2015, 10:40 am, Room 210F

Session: Materials for Energy Generation and Storage (8:20-10:20) & Mesoscale Phenomena in the Biosciences I (10:40-12:00)
Presenter: William Bentley, Fischell Department of Bioengineering, University of Maryland
Correspondent: Click to Email
Synthetic biology provides a means for articulating concepts into new products and products. Its toolbox is extensive, including the ability to create synthetic genomes and tailor their regulation. Early successes augmented the cell’s biosynthetic capacity and rewired its regulation, transforming our ability to produce products ranging from small molecules to fully functional therapeutic proteins at high yield. Also, the theoretical formalisms of metabolic engineering provided a basis for optimally routing its biochemical flux. With pathway analysis and optimization, cells are now engineered to produce large quantities of economically important molecules. Indeed, many “green” routes to chemical synthesis have appeared and many more are emerging. There exists great enthusiasm and investment to revolutionize several industries. Importantly, these activities have focused largely on the cell’s intracellular biochemical network and relied less on molecular cues from the immediate surroundings. Largely untapped within synthetic biology are the signaling motifs that guide cell processes and interactions among communicating populations. That is, signal molecules guide many cellular processes and these can be exploited to endow cells with “executive” function, where decision events are programmed and cells carry out tasks in addition to making products. That is, the cells themselves can be the primary “products” of synthetic biology – putting them to work in complex “noisy” environments will require tailoring their exposure to chemical cues. For example, we may eventually use engineered bacteria to fight cancer, cure diabetes, or “tune” the microbiome in our GI tracts. Biofabrication, the use of biological components and biological processes for assembly, can provide a means for tailoring hierarchical order in biological systems. We exploit the principles of biofabrication to create 3D “test tracks” where chemical cues can be spatiotemporally controlled and task-accomplishing bacteria can be appropriately designed. We will discuss the link between synthetic biology and biofabrication and highlight the potential for new discovery as well as process and product innovation.