Department of Biomedical Engineering and Institute for Genome Sciences and Policy, Duke University, Durham, NC 27708 USA.
Curr Opin Biotechnol. 2009 Aug;20(4):461-70. doi: 10.1016/j.copbio.2009.08.006. Epub 2009 Sep 3.
Synthetic biology encompasses the design of new biological parts and systems as well as the modulation of existing biological networks to generate novel functions. In recent years, increasing emphasis has been placed on the engineering of population-level behaviors using cell-cell communication. From the engineering perspective, cell-cell communication serves as a versatile regulatory module that enables coordination among cells in and between populations and facilitates the generation of reliable dynamics. In addition to exploring biological 'design principles' via the construction of increasingly complex dynamics, communication-based synthetic systems can be used as well-defined model systems to study ecological and social interactions such as competition, cooperation, and predation. Here we discuss the dynamic properties of cell-cell communication modules, how they can be engineered for synthetic circuit design, and applications of these systems.
合成生物学涵盖了新生物部件和系统的设计以及对现有生物网络的调节，以产生新的功能。近年来，越来越重视使用细胞间通信来工程化群体水平的行为。从工程学的角度来看，细胞间通信是一种通用的调节模块，可以协调群体内和群体间的细胞，并促进可靠的动力学的产生。除了通过构建越来越复杂的动力学来探索生物“设计原则”之外，基于通信的合成系统还可以用作定义明确的模型系统，以研究竞争、合作和捕食等生态和社会相互作用。在这里，我们讨论了细胞间通信模块的动态特性，以及如何对其进行工程设计以用于合成电路，并讨论了这些系统的应用。
