The Synthetic Biology Institute at UC Berkeley (SBI)
is working to make the engineering of new complex function in cells vastly more efficient, reliable, predictable, and safe. Its breakthroughs will speed the development of biologically engineered solutions to pressing global problems related to health, materials, energy, environment, and security.
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Recent News
Pilot program to bolster biophysical sciences’ innovation pipeline
UC Berkeley NewsCenter | 3.26.2012
UC Berkeley is launching the Bakar Fellows Program, a pilot program to help early-career faculty commercialize innovative research discoveries and bolster ongoing campus efforts to turn pioneering science into practical results. “Turning knowledge into real-world solutions is an important component of the work that many of our outstanding researchers do every day,” says Berkeley Vice Chancellor for Research Graham Fleming. “This program directs support toward faculty who are poised to make important discoveries early on in their career.” More >
A Shiny New Tool for Imaging Biomolecules
Berkeley Lab News Center | 3.23.2012
The ability to better understand cellular communication by observing signaling spatial patterns in the immune and other cellular systems would be a critical tool in the fight against disorders that lead to a broad range of health problems, including cancer. Such a tool is now at hand, thanks to a scientific team led by SBI and LBNL scientist Jay Groves, which has developed a technique for lacing artificial lipid membranes with billions of gold “bowtie” nanoantennas that can boost dramatically the intensity of an optical signal from a protein passing through a plasmonic “hot-spot." More >
Viral Building Blocks Mimic Cornea and Bone Tissue
Urban Times | 3.7.2011
Synthetic biologists led by Professor Seung-Wuk Lee have produced a viral film that mimics the structure of collagen fibrils - materials resembling skin and bone. More>
Shake It Up, Baby: Rock stars of biofuels unveil their latest hits
Biofuels Digest | 3.1.12
Part 1 of a three-part series on hot new routes to advanced biofuels and chemicals is called "I Want a New Bug." It looks at the formation of Lygos, the first spin-out company from JBEI, and the advances from the Jay Keasling lab to produce biofuels and renewable chemicals directly from sugar and cellulose, without using an enzymatic process. (Don't miss Part 2 of the series, if only for the subtitle: “Chain, Chain, Chain – Chain of Fuels.") More>
Professors' innovations benefit society, economy
UC Berkeley NewsCenter | 2.1.2012
SBI faculty Richard Mathies and Jay Keasling are examples of the many UC Berkeley researchers whose discoveries and the companies created to manufacture them are spurring the U.S. and California economies and saving lives. More >
Clearing a potential road block to bisabolane
Berkeley Lab News Center | 1.9.2012
SBI bioengineers Paul Adams and Jay Keasling, leading a team at JBEI, have solved the protein crystal structure of an enzyme in the Grand fir (Abies grandis) that synthesizes bisabolene, the enzyme precursor to bisabolane, a chemical compound found in plants that can be used as an alternative to diesel fuel. When engineered into microbes, this enzyme has inhibited their conversion of simple sugars into bisabolene. Understanding its structure, Adams says, "should make it possible to design changes in the enzyme that will enable microbes to make bisabolene faster.” More >
SBI faculty chart future of synthetic biology
Institute for Emerging Ethics & Technology | 1.6.2012
Four UC Berkeley scientists were cited in this overview of the field of synthetic biology at the Institute for Emerging Ethics & Technology. The article profiles research by Adam Arkin, Michelle Chang, John Dueber, and Cheryl Kerfeld, presented at the December 14, 2011 LabLinks: Synthetic Biology conference. The conference, sponsored at UC San Francisco by Cell Press, focused on the overall status and issues of the industry. More >
Coming Events
SynBio Supergroup
Wednesday 5.16.2012 | 6 p.m. | 106 Stanley Hall, UC Berkeley
Speakers: Diana Koulechova, Marqusee Lab
Using core mutations to explore transcription factor specificity
Hanson Lee, Dueber Lab
Engineering Enzyme Complexes for Sugar Utilization in Yeast
Our goal is to enhance communication and collaboration across labs in the local synthetic biology community.
To be added to the SynBio Supergroup listserv, send an email to synbiosupergroup@lists.berkeley.edu