Article ID | Journal | Published Year | Pages | File Type |
---|---|---|---|---|
1256642 | Current Opinion in Chemical Biology | 2012 | 10 Pages |
The ‘omics’ era, with its identification of genetic and protein components, has combined with systems biology, which provided insights into network structures, to set the stage for synthetic biology, an emerging interdisciplinary life science that uses engineering principles. By capitalizing on an iterative design cycle that involves molecular and computational biology tools to assemble functional designer devices from a comprehensive catalogue of standardized biological components with predictable functions, synthetic biology has significantly advanced our understanding of complex control dynamics that program living systems. Such insights, collected over the past decade, are priming a variety of synthetic biology-inspired biomedical applications that have the potential to revolutionize drug discovery and production technologies, as well as treatment strategies for infectious diseases and metabolic disorders.
Graphical abstractFigure optionsDownload full-size imageDownload high-quality image (157 K)Download as PowerPoint slideHighlights► New anti-infective treatment strategies. ► Tackling obesity. ► Strategies for diabetes treatment. ► Anticancer technology. ► Prosthetic networks – the treatment strategy of the future.