Discovery in Synthetic Biology Takes Us a Step Closer to New 'Industrial Revolution'

Scientists report that they have developed a method that cuts down the time it takes to make new 'parts' for microscopic biological factories from 2 days to only 6 hours.

Parts made up of DNA are re-engineered by scientists and put into cells to make biological factories. However, a major bottleneck in synthetic biology is the lack of parts from which to build new types of factories. To build parts using the current time-consuming method, scientists have to re-engineer DNA in a cell and observe how it works. If it functions according to their specifications, then the scientists store the part specifications in a catalogue.

In the study, the Imperial researchers demonstrate for the first time that the same method can be achieved in a test tube outside of a cell. This involves extracting from cells the machinery that produces mRNA and proteins and providing the energy and building blocks to help them survive in test tubes. The team then add their re-programmed DNA to the solution and observe how it functions.