Key Laboratory of Synthetic Biology, Institute of Plant Physiology and Ecology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China.
PLoS One. 2013;8(4):e60288. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0060288. Epub 2013 Apr 1.
Accurate and controllable regulatory elements such as promoters and ribosome binding sites (RBSs) are indispensable tools to quantitatively regulate gene expression for rational pathway engineering. Therefore, de novo designing regulatory elements is brought back to the forefront of synthetic biology research. Here we developed a quantitative design method for regulatory elements based on strength prediction using artificial neural network (ANN). One hundred mutated Trc promoter & RBS sequences, which were finely characterized with a strength distribution from 0 to 3.559 (relative to the strength of the original sequence which was defined as 1), were used for model training and test. A precise strength prediction model, NET90_19_576, was finally constructed with high regression correlation coefficients of 0.98 for both model training and test. Sixteen artificial elements were in silico designed using this model. All of them were proved to have good consistency between the measured strength and our desired strength. The functional reliability of the designed elements was validated in two different genetic contexts. The designed parts were successfully utilized to improve the expression of BmK1 peptide toxin and fine-tune deoxy-xylulose phosphate pathway in Escherichia coli. Our results demonstrate that the methodology based on ANN model can de novo and quantitatively design regulatory elements with desired strengths, which are of great importance for synthetic biology applications.
准确且可控的调控元件,如启动子和核糖体结合位点(RBS),是定量调控基因表达以实现理性途径工程的不可或缺的工具。因此,从头设计调控元件又回到了合成生物学研究的前沿。在这里,我们开发了一种基于人工神经网络(ANN)强度预测的调控元件定量设计方法。使用 100 个突变的 Trc 启动子和 RBS 序列进行模型训练和测试,这些序列的强度分布精细,从 0 到 3.559(相对于原始序列的强度,定义为 1)。最终构建了一个精确的强度预测模型 NET90_19_576,模型训练和测试的回归相关系数均高达 0.98。使用该模型在计算机上设计了 16 个人工元件。所有元件的实测强度与我们期望的强度之间都具有很好的一致性。在两种不同的遗传背景下验证了设计元件的功能可靠性。设计的元件成功用于提高 BmK1 肽毒素的表达,并在大肠杆菌中精细调节 deoxy-xylulose phosphate 途径。我们的结果表明,基于 ANN 模型的方法可以从头设计具有所需强度的调控元件,这对合成生物学应用具有重要意义。