Principal Investigator Ron Weiss
Project Website http://groups.csail.mit.edu/synbio/projects/assembly-and-delivery-of-genetic-ci…
Fundamental to mammalian synthetic biology is the ability to reliably construct and deliver synthetic gene circuit into the cell and to have the circuit function over time.
Current methods include co-transfection of multiple plasmid and transfection of single plasmids with 2A-concatenanted multi-cistronic trannscription units, but they are inherently limited in utility.
Stable cell lines are often created by random viral integration. Slightly better is the use of Flp and Cre integration. However, non-specific integrations are observed. Beside these problems, the transferred gene circuit is subject to epigenetic silencing.
In this project, we are developing reliable and efficient way of synthetic gene circuit assembly and delivery allowing flexible gene circuit design and ensuring high fidelity of circuit function. The mechanisms we use allow modular construction and persistently reliable function over long times after delivery.