Synthetic Biology and Its Applications

About

Laboratory work will focus on genetically modifying baker’s yeast (S. cerevisiae) with a previously designed set of plasmid vectors. The constructed yeast strains will be used to study intricate mechanisms of gene expression regulation and to illustrate the concept of logic gates in synthetic biology. Three distinct fluorescence proteins will be used as protein expression reporters. By combining different inputs to induce gene expression, the fluorescence of different reporter proteins will be measured as output.

Students will learn how to work in the molecular biology lab, lab safety rules, and how to operate various laboratory equipment (e.g., PCR machines, centrifuges, vortex mixers, thermostats, etc.). They will learn the basic principles of logic gates and their applications in synthetic biology. Students will collect and analyse the data using different research methods, including live-cell fluorescent microscope imaging, FACS, and western blotting.

Course leader

Ilona Faustova Vice Director of the Institute of Bioengineering, Associate Professor in Molecular Biology, Programme Director of the Science and Technology and Bioengineering programmes Artemi Maljavin Junior Lecturer in Molecular Biology, Assistant of Programme Director Juli Mukhadze Junior Research Fellow in Molecular Biotechnology Stepan Strelchenko Specialist of Molecular Systems Biology

Target group

Upper secondary school students, beginner-level BSc

Course aim

The student completing the course will:

- know the main branches of synthetic biology;
- learn potential drawbacks and ethical issues raised by synthetic biology development;
know different molecular cloning techniques, including Golden Gate assembly and digest/ligate cloning;
- be able to perform PCR, DNA gel electrophoresis, bacterial and yeast transformations, and DNA extraction from bacterial cells;
- learn about different sequencing methods and how to analyse the results of Sanger sequencing;
- learn the fundamentals of the western blotting method and how the conduct western blot analysis;
- learn to analyse the live-cell fluorescent microscope imaging data;
- learn the basics of FACS analysis.

Fee info