“The Second Decade of Synthetic Biology: 2010–102020”, 2020-10-14 (; similar):
Synthetic biology is among the most hyped research topics this century, and in 2010 it entered its teenage years. But rather than these being a problematic time, we’ve seen synthetic biology blossom and deliver many new technologies and landmark achievements.
…Looking back at 2010, the biggest synthetic biology story of the year was the complete synthesis of a working bacterial genome by a team at the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI)
…Could hard biological problems such as context, noise, burden and cross-reactivity really be solved to allow us to engineer cells like we wire-up electronic circuits? Well, thanks to a lot of challenging technical biology and biological engineering work undertaken by many in the field, but especially MIT’s Chris Voigt, the answer to this was yes.
…It’s no surprise therefore, that synthetic biology groups were the first to pounce on gene editing technologies like CRISPR as they appeared in 2011 and 2012.
…While there’s no doubt that CRISPR was the breakthrough of the decade in biosciences, it’s perhaps its forerunner TALENs (TAL-Effector Nucleases) that deserve more credit in revolutionizing how synthetic biology changed in the past 10 years.
…The drop in cost for gene synthesis can mostly be attributed to new methods for printing thousands of oligonucleotides in parallel on chips to make ‘oligo pools’ and teaming this with next generation sequencing (NGS) as a much more cost-effective method for validating assembled DNA.
…High-power computation also opened up new frontiers in what can be modelled and predicted in the last 10 years…This helped inform JCVI’s project towards a minimal genome, which delivered a further landmark in 2016 with the impressive engineering of a bacteria with a minimized synthetic genome
…Synthetic genomics also moved into eukaryotes with the international Sc2.0 consortium constructing highly-modified, yet fully-functional synthetic versions of Baker’s yeast chromosomes
…DNA also became a way to store data, initially just in vitro via chemical synthesis, but then also in cells via ‘molecular recorder’ genetic systems that use recombinases or CRISPR to modify DNA as cells grow, divide and change their gene expression
…Academic achievements include engineering cells to fix CO2 and nitrogen, and getting yeast to make opioids and cannabinoids.
…A multibillion dollar industry now exists that makes chemicals, drugs, proteins, probiotics, sensors, fertilisers, textiles, food and many other things from engineered cells.