Collaborative Research: Exploiting the Syntegron Technology Platform for Assembly and 0ptimisation of Complex Genetic Ensembles

工程微生物可以作为工厂，将可再生的起始材料，如糖和植物来源的生物质，转化为有价值的产品，包括化学品，燃料和药物。虽然这种方法的可行性和实用性现在已经很好地建立，但通过引入特定基因来工程化微生物和植物以生产新产品仍然具有技术挑战性和资源密集型。因此，使新的生物合成平台具有商业可行性和效率的这些障碍限制了新技术创造公共利益和经济影响的速度。此外，目前尚不可能有效地利用大量生物多样性的来源，如植物和生物群落的遗传信息库，因为鉴定和利用遗传“毛坯钻石”的费用太高，技术密集，大多数实验室无法进行。为了满足这些需求，该项目将开发一套技术，使研究人员能够有效地组装，评估和优化新的生物合成系统，通过利用进化机制来生成和选择遗传部件的功能组件。这项工作包括从植物基因组中识别有前途的基因的新方法，使工程师能够监测和控制细胞内生物制造的生物传感器，以及使更广泛的研究界能够将这些能力应用于广泛应用的计算设计工具。更广泛的影响：这项工作将共同创造工具，促进可持续生物制造平台的发展，并能够生产新的医学和工业有用的分子，从而为国家经济做出重大贡献。该项目还将为学生和博士后研究人员提供一个快速新兴领域的多学科培训。

Engineered microorganisms may serve as factories to convert renewable starting materials, such as sugars and plant-derived biomass, into valuable products including chemicals, fuels, and medicines. Although the feasibility and utility of this approach is now well established, engineering microorganisms and plants to produce novel products through the introduction of specific genes remains technically challenging and resource-intensive. Consequently, these barriers to bringing new biological synthesis platforms to commercial feasibility and efficiency limit the rate at which new technologies create public benefits and economic impacts. Moreover, it is not yet possible to efficiently harness sources of vast biodiversity, such as libraries of genetic information from plants and communities of organisms, because identifying and utilizing genetic "diamonds in the rough" remains too costly and technically intensive to conduct in most laboratories. To meet these needs, this project will develop a technology suite that enables researchers to efficiently assemble, evaluate, and optimize novel biological synthesis systems by harnessing evolutionary mechanisms to both generate and select for functional assemblies of genetic parts. This work includes novel approaches for identifying promising genes from plant genomes, biological sensors that enable engineers to monitor and control biomanufacturing within cells, and computational design tools that will enable the broader research community to apply these capabilities to a broad range of applications. Broader Impacts: Together, this work will create tools that catalyze the development of sustainable biological manufacturing platforms and enable the production of new medically and industrially useful molecules, thus contributing significantly to the Nation's economy. The project will also provide multi-disciplinary training of students and postdoctoral researchers in a rapidly emerging field.