Biotechnology Journal

Biotechnol. J. 2015, 10, 229–230

DOI 10.1002/biot.201500025

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Editorial: Synthetic biology – ready for application

S

ynthetic biology has become a major driving force of modern molecular biotechnology. Fresh ideas and new concepts like standardization, modularization, orthogonalization or refactorization are the motors behind ambitious projects which seemed utopistic only ten years ago. Though praised as a new discipline, modern “synthetic” biotechnology is sometimes hard or even impossible to be distinguished from “classical” but pragmatic biotechnology approaches. Unfortunately, from a practical viewpoint synthetic biology still has the connotation of playing with molecular toys. Lego bricks are designed and assembled, molecular circuits are engineered and as a result cells are blinking and doing other fancy things. This is certainly not the ultimate destination of synthetic biology.

Synthetic biology has become more application oriented, by designing and implementing synthetic pathways in industrial biotechnology The present Special issue shows that synthetic biology has become more and more application oriented. Apart from designing and implementing synthetic pathways in industrial biotechnology, genome-reduced cells will certainly be the industrial workhorses of the future and synthetic tools and circuits are already used to solve important problems in biomedicine. If, in a pragmatic attitude, some dogmas of synthetic biology are rather taken as guidelines than as strict rules, the engineering concepts of synthetic biology already today lead to solutions for complex and realistic problems. Doubtlessly, there are already a lot of solutions with “synthetic biolo-

Roland Eils, Julia Ritzerfeld, Wolfgang Wiechert

gy inside”. The present Special issue thus focusses on practical applications of synthetic biology. In 2012, a consortium with members from five Helmholtz centers in Heidelberg, Jülich, Karlsruhe, Braunschweig, München and Saarbrücken joined forces with teams from the Universities of Heidelberg and Freiburg and founded the Helmholtz Initiative on Synthetic Biology. Focusing on applications in biotechnology and medicine, the initiative established as a know how pool and exchange stock for new ideas all over Germany. Several national events and international symposia were organized and, last but not least, the award winning iGEM teams from Heidelberg (Grand prize winner 2013 and 2014) and Aachen (Measurement track winner 2014) were coached by consortial members. A substantial part of the contributions within the present special volume comes from members of the initiative. These and others have been invited from outstanding contributions at the international symposium “Synthetic Biology – from understanding to application”, which was organized by the initiative in December 2013. Two highlighted articles deal with novel synthetic approaches in industrial biotechnology. Chen et al. [1] deal with the construction of a fully glycerol-independent pathway for 1,3-propanediol synthesis by recruiting native metabolites of central carbon and nitrogen metabolism. In her Commentary, Ewelina Celinska [2] points out that this constitutes a “paradigm shift in our understanding of microbial 1,3-PDO production”. Unthan et al. [3] aim at the construc-

© 2015 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim

tion of Corynebacterium glutamicum chassis strains with streamlined genomes by deletion of irrelevant gene clusters. Novelty and significance of this approach in establishing platform strains for biotechnology is appreciated in the accompanying Commentary by Victor de Lorenzo [4]. Novel genetic and molecular tools are subject to another series of original contributions and review papers. Synthetic secondary chromosomes in Escherichia coli as described by Messerschmidt et al. [5] are a promising alternative to integrate new genetic features into this chassis organism. The review paper of Berens et al. [6] deals with RNA aptamers as a versatile tool to control gene expression. The authors show how aptamers can be integrated into synthetic riboswitches that are functional in vivo and give an outlook to future applications. CRISPR genome engineering has drawn much attention in recent time. In another review article, Schmidt and Grimm [7] survey recent progress in gene editing of mammalian cells based on viral vectors as CRISPR delivery tools. Coupling cellular functions with optical excitation or sensing has become one of the most attractive research tools in cellular investigations of all kinds. Teo et al. [8] introduce novel xylose biosensors for Saccharomyces cerevisiae which can be used in the future as a tool to engineer and optimize yeast that efficiently utilizes xylose as carbon source. Beyer et al. [9] review the state of the art of optogenetic signaling control in mammalian cells. In the field of mammalian synthetic biology, Rand et al. [10] are

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Biotechnol. J. 2015, 10, 229–230 www.biotecvisions.com

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concerned with heterogeneity in the onset of transgene expression from synthetic tetracycline-dependent promoters. They show that the onset of transgene expression triggered by synthetic promotors can be highly variable in individual cells. Albers et al. [11] created two-dimensional protein patterns and populated them with rat neurons in order to show how the shape of two-dimensional patterns influences the formation of neuronal networks. After all, these papers do not only broaden the scope of applications, but also substantially contribute to the extension of fundamental knowledge. In fact, Frank et al. [12] argue that there are even potential risks in focusing solely on the development of applications rather than doing fundamental research. An application-centered approach may “initiate and become part of a self-reinforcing loop and self-fulfilling prophecy – driven from within and outside synthetic biology – that could ultimately narrow down horizons of future knowledge as well as the chances for new applications and benefits from synthetic biology in the long term”. Finally, we’d like to thank all peer reviewers for their critical and helpful comments. Many thanks also to the Wiley editorial team. Judy Peng, Uta Göbel and Jing Zhu assisted us in all phases of the Speical issue project and were available 7 days a week to solve urgent problems.

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Dr. Roland Eils German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) and University of Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany E-mail: [email protected]

[4]

[5]

Dr. Julia Ritzerfeld German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), Heidelberg, Germany E-mail: [email protected]

[6]

[7]

[8]

Dr. Wolfgang Wiechert IBG-1: Biotechnology, Forschungszentrum Jülich, Jülich, Germany E-mail: [email protected]

[9]

[10]

References [1] Chen, Z., Geng, F., Zeng, A.-P., Protein design and engineering of a de novo pathway for microbial production of 1, 3-propanediol from glucose. Biotechnol. J. 2015, 10, 284–289. [2] Celinska, E., Fully glycerol-independent microbial production of 1,3-propanediol via non-natural pathway: Paving the way to success with synthetic tiles. Biotechnol. J. 2015, 10, 242–243. [3] Unthan, S., Baumgart, M., Radek, A., Herbst, M. et al., Chassis organism from

[11]

[12]

Corynebacterium glutamicum – a topdown approach to identify and delete irrelevant gene cluster. Biotechnol. J. 2015, 10, 290–301. De Lorenzo, V., Chassis organism from Corynebacterium glutamicum: The way towards biotechnological domestication of Corynebacteria. Biotechnol. J. 2015, 10, 244–245. Messerschmidt, S.J., Kemter, F.S., Schindler, D., Waldminghaus, T., Synthetic secondary chromosomes in Escherichia coli based on the replication origin of chromosome II in Vibrio cholerae. Biotechnol. J. 2015, 10, 302–314. Berens, C., Groher, F., Suess, B., RNA aptamers as genetic control devices. Biotechnol. J. 2015, 10, 246–257. Schmidt, F., Grimm, D., CRISPR genome engineering and viral gene delivery: A case of mutual attraction. Biotechnol. J. 2015, 10, 258–272. Teo, W. S., Chang, M. W., Bacterial XylRs and synthetic promoters function as genetically encoded xylose biosensors in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Biotechnol. J. 2015, 10, 315–322. Beyer, H.M., Naumann, S., Weber, W., Radziwill, G., Optogenetic control of signaling in mammalian cells. Biotechnol. J. 2015, 10, 273–283. Rand, U., Riedel, J., Hillebrand, U., Shin, D. et al., Single-cell analysis reveals heterogeneity in onset of transgene expression from synthetic Tetracycline-dependent promoters. Biotechnol. J. 2015, 10, 323–331. Albers, J., Toma, K., Offenhäusser, A., Engineering connectivity by multiscale micropatterning of individual populations of neurons. Biotechnol. J. 2015, 10, 332–338. Frank, D., Heil, R., Synthetic biology’s self-fulfilling prophecy – dangers of confinement from within and outside. Biotechnol. J. 2015, 10, 231–235.

© 2015 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim

Editorial: Synthetic biology--ready for application.

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