IGEM:MIT/2007/Notebook/2007-6-17
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- Paper Research
Notes from Evening Meeting
- Attendance: SK, LBH, FL, DL, JH, AL, TTP
- Univ. Latin America -- iron biosensors?
- Cadmium surrounding bacteria
- Our goal: to detect and capture (stick to) metal
- Find papers for...
- metal-induced detector/promoter
- bacteria turned on by metal? genes turned on by metal in surroundings?
- similarly, glass/plastic-induced?
- See the arsenic project for planning genes
- Example = lactose -- binds to molecule in cell -- prevents/enhances transcription factor
- Prairie View (Texas, 2005): trimetallic sensor, bound to GFP?
- iron promoter
- see References
- did they get it to work? (Yes)
- use their BB part (input)
- Note on BB Registry: green/red color coding indicates usability
- Possible contacts (to get parts/organisms)
- UC Santa Barbara (JH Waite -- Organic Chemistry -- Marine Biotechnology Building --http://www.chem.ucsb.edu/people/faculty/waite/index.shtml)
- Prairie View
- Pohang University, Korea (will ask my dad about Korean research culture)
- Filters: if bacteria stick to wall of filter system, clean water will result
- What is the state of the art water filtration system?
- Specificity: what will the bacteria bind to?
- Limitations -- peptide binds to certain things; have promoters?
- Find bacteria engineered to recognize multiple things?
- Are sticky peptides expressed on the surface of bacteria?
- Linear surface protein; N and C termini both pointing outside on E. coli [Toan]
- How to ensure all metal in whatever solution (water?) is, indeed, gone?
Further Research
- Stickiness; Detection and Capture; How are environmental problems solved today? Also, what is a hard-to-capture metal?
- Variations on systems
- (1) Make bacteria take in/capture metal (ingest/engulf) --> become more sticky --> sticks to surface/wall/filter wall [dead cells will not matter]
- (2) Proteins are expressed outside, stick to metal, stick to each other and clump -- the bacteria are always present, but only functional when metal is present
- Input: metal? light? should be straightforward and logical
- Metal promoter in existence? (Texas)
- Will metal bind DNA directly or is there a middle man?
- Output: see if bacteria sticks to metal
To research for a group meeting on Wednesday afternoon
- LBH = filtration, biosystems and current methods (biofiltration?)
- AL, TTP, AK = Prairie View references list; promoters for glass/metal; gene expressed --> protein made?; downstream pathway -- what sticks to it best/easiest? Done before? Can we obtain it?; iron genes
- JH, SK = stickiness, what sticky protein can bind to; how to carry out exactly; other organisms (vs. mussel) that have sticky genes; is the sticky peptide on E. coli (Pohang papers) expressed on the surface?; will the sticky peptide on E. coli bind to metal?; how to stickify without killing cell, if possible; how to trigger stickiness; specific protein [mfp 1/5/3?]
- Each subgroup will have a wiki page to post links/resources/ideas/discussion