{"id":1883,"date":"2012-05-23T20:20:26","date_gmt":"2012-05-23T20:20:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/?p=1883"},"modified":"2012-05-23T20:20:26","modified_gmt":"2012-05-23T20:20:26","slug":"life-engineering-needs-a-technology-base","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/?p=1883","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Life engineering needs a technology base\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Some 300 students and researchers attended to the symposium. (Photo\u2019s: Abram Scheulderman)<\/p><\/div>\n

The new field of synthetic biology lies in between huge promises for 21st century sustainable productions of food, fuels and materials, and tinkered solutions. \u201cWe need to develop technology standards.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

An early morning crowd gathered in front of De Veste theatre last Monday morning. Inside, a group of impeccably dressed students, wearing grey suits and orange ties, hosted some 250 visitors at the Life Science symposium on \u2018Synthetic Biology\u2019. After two years of preparation, the symposium committee of the LIFE study association (life science and technology) was about to present their line-up of internationally renowned experts in this new field of science that is said to \u2018redefine life\u2019.<\/p>\n

So what is this \u201csynthetic biology?\u201d, chairman Professor Cees Dekker (head of bionanoscience at Applied Sciences) asked the speakers\u2019 forum at the end of the day. \u201cIt\u2019s biology turning into an engineering science,\u201d replied Professor Martin Fussenegger from ETH Z\u00fcrich. \u201cIt\u2019s using biobricks from nature to build novel combinations,\u201d said Dr Dirk Stemerdink from the Rathenau institute. \u201cIt\u2019s like pornography,\u201d said Dr Drew Endy from Stanford University. \u201cYou know it when you see it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some see synthetic biology as an enhanced form of genetic engineering. Professor Eriko Takano, who lectures on \u2018synthetic microbiology\u2019 at the University of Groningen, works along this line. By sequencing the genome of bacteria in search of antibiotic substances, she discovered a \u2018treasure dome\u2019 of 20 to 50 antibiotic gene clusters per genome. She collects and shuffles these antibiotic building blocks to arrive at new antibiotic compounds against which no bacterial resistance exists yet. \u201cWe\u2019re producing natural compounds that don\u2019t exist in nature,\u201d the professor explained. \u201cBy changing modules around, you get an enormous variety in synthesised antibiotics.\u201d Prof. Takano works with DSM to bring new antibiotics to the market.<\/p>\n

But synthetic biology is more than just sophisticated genetic modification. The Swiss Professor Martin Fussenegger (ETH) for example developed an artificial cell to inseminate cows at the right moment. \u201cInsemination of cows is very important for the milk production, which is the basis for all the Swiss chocolate and cheese,\u201d the professor explained only half jokingly. The artificial cell, a cellulose sulphate capsule containing bull\u2019s sperm, is put into a cow\u2019s vagina. It just sits there until it senses the lutenising hormone (LH) rising. The membrane then shrivels, releasing the sperm at exactly the right time of the cow\u2019s ovulation. \u201cIt works better than a farmer staring into the cow\u2019s eyes\u201d, explained Prof. Fussenegger, who told the audience his group is developing the same technology for human use as well.<\/p>\n

Inventive and entertaining as this new technology may be, it\u2019s time for some fundamentals first, argued Stanford\u2019s Dr Endy, who said: \u201dStop doing this stupid bacteria tricks.\u201d As an example, he told of how much effort it had cost to develop a switchable bit in bacterial DNA. His PhD student \u2013 \u201cpoor Jerome\u201d – had succeeded, but only after three years and 7500 assays. \u201cThe trouble is: the technology base is missing for successful development,\u201d Dr Endy said. \u201cThere is an over-selection in bio-engineering for immediate answers. Therefore, not enough effort is put into developing tools and standards.\u201d Most applications were \u201ccarelessly engineered\u201d, Endy explained, and \u201ccareless made parts can give rise to \u2018bonus behaviour\u2019.\u201d Despite the parts lists at iGEM\u2019s partsregistry.org and Stanford\u2019s Biofab initiative, universal building blocks are still far off, argued Dr Endy, who pleads for a more systematic and fundamental approach.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the private company Amyris (near San Francisco) that took this systematic approach the furthest. Dr Kirsten Benjamin, who leads the microbial physiology group there, sketched the highly automated screening procedure called Automated Strain Engineering (ASE), which is a combination of molecular biology, robotised high trough-put screening (HTS) and software development. Thus, DNA sequences are tested on their phenotypical effects, with the results then being stored in a growing library that now contains some 20,000 parts. In this way, Amyris develops some 800 yeast strains per week.<\/p>\n

The irony is that such data mining projects are better off when publicly funded. Not only because they\u2019re often too expensive for a single company to finance (Amyris lost 60 percent of its share value over the last year), but also because the data are not accessible to other researchers. Dr Endy: \u201cSustained financing is needed over a long time if we\u2019re to realise the enormous potentials of synthetic biology.\u201d<\/p>\n

www.lifesciencesymposium.nl<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The new field of synthetic biology lies in between huge promises for 21st century sustainable productions of food, fuels and materials, and tinkered solutions. \u201cWe need to develop technology standards.\u201d An early morning crowd gathered in front of De Veste theatre last Monday morning. Inside, a group of impeccably dressed students, wearing grey suits and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,6],"tags":[41,81,134,162,253,260,278,428],"class_list":["post-1883","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-delta","tag-amyris","tag-cees-dekker","tag-drew-endy","tag-eriko-tkano","tag-kirsten-benjamin","tag-life","tag-martin-fussenegger","tag-synthetic-biology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1883"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1883\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}