Synthetic Biology

A Lab Manual

Synthetic Biology: A Lab Manual is the first manual for laboratory work in the new and rapidly expanding field of synthetic biology. Aimed at non-specialists, it details protocols central to synthetic biology in both education and research. In addition, it provides all the information that teachers and students from high schools and tertiary institutions need for a colorful lab course in bacterial synthetic biology using chromoproteins and designer antisense RNAs. As a bonus, practical material is provided for students of the annual international Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition. The manual is based upon a highly successful course at Sweden's Uppsala University and is coauthored by one of the pioneers of synthetic biology and two bioengineering postgraduate students.

An inspiring foreword is written by another pioneer in the field, Harvard's George Church:
“Synthetic biology is to early recombinant DNA as a genome is to a gene. Is there anything that SynBio will not impact? There was no doubt that the field of SynBio needed ‘A Lab Manual’ such as the one that you now hold in your hands.”

Transcription and translation are coupled in bacteria. The central dogma of molecular biology. The top and middle structures are taken from Wikipedia with permission. The expression level of aeBlue chromoprotein varies with plasmid copy number. The copy numbers of the plasmid vectors used were medium-low (left) and high (right). Fine tuning of chromoprotein expression using sRNAs.

Read about the interview with the authors!