Spring 2014 Synthetic Biology
CH391L: Synthetic Biology (Spring 2014)
Mondays 2-5 PM MBB 2.456
Unique #: 53230
Instructors:
- Prof. Jeffrey Barrick <jbarrick AT cm DOT utexas PERIOD edu>
- Dr. Dennis Mishler <dennis PERIOD mishler AT gmail DOT com>
Course web page: The course web site on SynBioCyc.org will host course handouts, readings, and assignments.
Previous year's websites:
Useful links:
Motivation
The purpose of this course is to become familiar with the techniques, biological parts, accomplishments, problems, and challenges of synthetic biology. For the most part, we will focus on E. coli and yeast. Participants will be expected to individually contribute to OWW pages describing the history, development, and implementation details of engineered parts and organisms from the scientific literature. Then, they will be expected to create a proposal as part of a group with specific experimental and modeling details for using synthetic biology to solve an outstanding problem with technological or societal impact.
Assignments
Coursework will consist of in-class oral presentations on scientific papers or research proposals and a "written" component consisting of Wiki page edits on OpenWetWare. All participants in the course will be expected to provide feedback concerning the content of presentations and the content of Wiki pages.
Grading Rubric for Wiki Pages, Presentations, and Participation
Grading Rubric for Final Project
Topics
Topics
Week 1: Introduction
Week 2: What is a part?
Week 3: Assembling the parts
Week 4: Methods of Part Creation, Prospecting, Selection, and Optimization
Week 5: Finding and Improving Parts
Week 6: Genetic Engineered Technologies
Week 7: Communication and Containment
Week 8: Helpful Microbes
Week 9: Biomedical Applications
Week 10: Math, Engineering, and Bubbles
Week 11: Miscellaneous I
Week 12: Miscellaneous II
Week 13: Miscellaneous III
Ideas for Topics
- Use COPASI to model circuits (like repressilator) and switches, changing parameters to tune behavior.
