Reconstituting Biology – a Chart to Minimal Cells

关于重建生物学的洛伦兹中心研讨会将于2020年6月底和7月初在荷兰莱顿举行。该研讨会有55名与会者，重点讨论了以工程最小合成细胞为中心的研究的当前最新技术水平和挑战。在最近在德国和荷兰成立的财团以及在美国成立的大型研究团队的基础上，该研讨会将邀请来自欧洲和美国的领导者在该领域工作。研讨会主要是以小组讨论为基础，将包括来自受邀团体的受训人员和一些选定的初级教师。该研讨会为学员和初级教师提供了与该领域专家研究人员建立联系的独特机会，可能会带来新的研究思路。研讨会将集中在四个问题/目标：1）我们将永远能够重建任何生命一样？2)定义人类设计的元素或积木在构建合成最小细胞中的作用。3)目前自下而上重建细胞功能的主要限制是什么？我们如何克服它们？4)定义建立研究社区的方法/实践，以共享构建块、技术和协议，确保研究结果在许多实验室中可重复。研讨会讨论将由研讨会共同主席沿着与会者的意见收集，目的是将其作为一个观点文章发表，以达到一个大的社区。该奖项由分子和细胞生物科学部的细胞动力学和功能集群以及系统和合成生物学集群共同资助。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The Lorentz Center workshop on Reconstituting Biology will be held in Leiden, The Netherlands at the end of June and early July 2020. The workshop, capped at 55 participants, focuses on discussing the current state-of-the-art and challenges in research centering on engineering minimal synthetic cells. Building upon recent consortiums formed in Germany and The Netherlands and large research teams formed in the US, the workshop will feature leaders working in this space from Europe and the US. The workshop is mostly discussion-based in small groups and will include trainees from the invited groups and some selected junior faculty. The workshop provides unique opportunities for the trainees and junior faculty to network with expert researchers in the field, potentially leading to new research ideas. The workshop will focus on four questions/goals: 1) Will we ever be able to reconstitute anything life-like? 2) Define the role of human-designed elements or building blocks play in building synthetic minimal cells. 3) What are currently the main limitations for reconstituting cellular functionalities from the bottom up and how do we overcome them? 4) Define approaches/practices to set up research community that shares building blocks, techniques, and protocols to ensure findings are reproducible across many labs. The workshop discussion will be collected by the workshop co-chairs along with input from the participants, with an aim to publish it as a perspective article to reach a large community. This award was co-funded by the Cellular Dynamics and Function Cluster and the Systems and Synthetic Biology Cluster in the Division of Molecular and Cellular Biosciences.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.