Systems and Synthetic Biology and Metabolic Engineering

The research seeks to understand and harness complex cellular systems for industrial biocatalysis and disease prevention through development and application of omics, synthetic biology, metabolic flux engineering, systems biology, and metabolic engineering tools. Research topics include development of Modular Cell Design (MODCELL) technology for rapid creation of novel biocatalysts (Trinh), understanding of mechanisms of cellular robustness against environmental perturbation, development of effective defensive tools to boost cellular robustness for applications from disease prevention to novel biocatalysis (Trinh), and application of computational methods to understand stochastic and spatial effects in cell signaling networks (Abel).