Biophysics and Structural Genomics Division, Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, Homi Bhabha National Institute (HBNI), Block A/F, Sector-I, Bidhannagar, Kolkata 700064, India.
ACS Synth Biol. 2021 Oct 15;10(10):2456-2464. doi: 10.1021/acssynbio.1c00279. Epub 2021 Sep 20.
This work presented an application of genetic distributed computing, where an abstract computational problem was mapped on a complex truth table and solved using simple genetic circuits distributed among various cell populations. Maze generating and solving are challenging problems in mathematics and computing. Here, we mapped all the input-output matrices of a 2 × 2 mathematical maze on a 4-input-4-output truth table. The logic values of four chemical inputs determined the 16 different 2 × 2 maze problems on a chemical space. We created six multi-input synthetic genetic AND gates, which distributed among six cell populations and organized in a single layer. Those cell populations in a mixed culture worked as a computational solver, which solved the chemically generated maze problems by expressing or not expressing four different fluorescent proteins. The three available "solutions" were visualized by glowing bacteria, and for the 13 "no solution" cases, no bacteria glowed. Thus, our system not only solved the maze problems but also showed the number of solvable and unsolvable problems. This work may have significance in cellular computation and synthetic biology.
这项工作展示了遗传分布式计算的应用，其中一个抽象的计算问题被映射到一个复杂的真值表上，并使用分布在各种细胞群体中的简单遗传电路来解决。迷宫生成和求解是数学和计算中的难题。在这里，我们将一个 2×2 数学迷宫的所有输入-输出矩阵映射到一个 4 输入-4 输出的真值表上。四种化学输入的逻辑值决定了化学空间上的 16 个不同的 2×2 迷宫问题。我们创建了六个多输入合成遗传与门，它们分布在六个细胞群体中，并组织在一个单层中。在混合培养物中的这些细胞群体作为计算求解器工作，通过表达或不表达四种不同的荧光蛋白来解决化学产生的迷宫问题。三种可用的“解决方案”通过发光细菌可视化，而对于 13 个“无解”的情况，没有细菌发光。因此，我们的系统不仅解决了迷宫问题，还显示了可解和不可解问题的数量。这项工作在细胞计算和合成生物学中可能具有重要意义。
