Meeting Minutes for March 21, 2006
From 2006.igem.org
Present: John, Kara, Angela, Annie, Jessie, Peter, Brendan, Katherine, Victoria, Megan
Journal Club Presentation
Construction of a Genetic Toggle Switch in E. Coli
by Victoria and Megan
- purpose: to integrate theory and experiment by constructing and testing a synthetic, bistable gene circuit (Toggle switch) based on the predictions of a simple mathematical model
- integrate (mathetic) theory and (biology) experiment
- mathematical models supposed to predict how much transcribed, testing expected outcomes
- took a switch that self-regulates and has inducer (heat, chemical) that starts
- prediction was wrong due to gene variability
- simplest, as few reagents as possible better
- specialized promoters
- ribozyme binding sites, harnessed in plasmid; ensure that they are turned into proteins individually
- genetic engineering (memory device) insert into something that you would want to be turned on for a long time
- registry of biological parts at MIT; biological switch, wire linked together (electronic diagramà biological diagram
2005 iGEM project summaries:
UCSF: Kara; genetic circuit of bacteria to respond to temperature gradient, analog vs. digital
Toronto: Angela; Cell See-Us Thermometer and Bacterial Etch-a-Sketch; used mRFP and GFP didn’t have a result
Berkeley: John; cell-cell communicator, send out genomes to other bacteria via a specific pore (channel) and the other bacteria would send something back when it received that message
Harvard: Peter; bio-sketch; use UV pen to write on bacteria, use GFP mutation as reporter; not so much a toggle switch as a one way switch; used heat to “erase”; didn’t work
Caltech: Annie; detect caffeine in solution; YFP and GFP high concentration of caffeine would repress GFP and YFP would glow; if decaf, YFP would be repressed and GFP would grow; if medium, then both would be present.
