Synthetic Biology: A Bridge between Artificial and Natural Cells.
Synthetic Biology: A Bridge between Artificial and Natural Cells.
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DOI：
10.3390/life4041092
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发表时间：
2014-12-19
期刊：
影响因子：
--
通讯作者：
Tan C
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Ding Y;Wu F;Tan C
人造细胞是简单的细胞样实体，具有天然细胞的某些特性。一般来说，人造细胞由三部分组成：（1）生物膜，作为保护屏障，同时允许细胞与环境之间的交流； (2)基于基因序列合成蛋白质的转录和翻译机器； (3)控制整个细胞动态的遗传模块。人造细胞是最小且定义明确的系统，与天然细胞相比，可以更容易地设计和控制。人造细胞可用作仿生系统，以最小化细胞复杂性的干扰来研究和理解细胞的自然动力学。然而，人工细胞和天然细胞之间仍然存在显着差距。我们可以将多少信息编码到人造细胞中？要实现人造细胞的强大功能，最少需要哪些因素？人造细胞能否有效地与其环境进行通信？人造细胞可以复制、分裂甚至进化吗？在这里，我们回顾了可以缩小人造细胞和天然细胞之间差距的合成生物学方法。这些差距的缩小将导致合成生物学、细胞生物学和生物医学应用的进步。
Artificial cells are simple cell-like entities that possess certain properties of natural cells. In general, artificial cells are constructed using three parts: (1) biological membranes that serve as protective barriers, while allowing communication between the cells and the environment; (2) transcription and translation machinery that synthesize proteins based on genetic sequences; and (3) genetic modules that control the dynamics of the whole cell. Artificial cells are minimal and well-defined systems that can be more easily engineered and controlled when compared to natural cells. Artificial cells can be used as biomimetic systems to study and understand natural dynamics of cells with minimal interference from cellular complexity. However, there remain significant gaps between artificial and natural cells. How much information can we encode into artificial cells? What is the minimal number of factors that are necessary to achieve robust functioning of artificial cells? Can artificial cells communicate with their environments efficiently? Can artificial cells replicate, divide or even evolve? Here, we review synthetic biological methods that could shrink the gaps between artificial and natural cells. The closure of these gaps will lead to advancement in synthetic biology, cellular biology and biomedical applications.