Imperial College/Courses/Spring2008/Synthetic Biology/Team 5

Overview

This page may be used to host the write-up of a mini-iGEM project being undertaken by Team 5 of the Imperial College London Synthetic Biology course 2008 - the project being to academically investigate a theoretical iGEM proposal and present it to a mock 'funding committee'.

If this is not allowed/isn't acceptable, please email me at taa104 at ic.ac.uk and I'll find somewhere else to host this!

Introduction

Our proposal for an iGEM project was originally based on an interface between electrical and biological systems. It has since evolved to be an attempt to construct a bio-implant - a synthetic gland, as it were - that can administer drugs, release hormones or perform other functions when triggered to do so by an external stimulus. Instead of an electrical stimulus we have opted to utilise an optical fiber implanted through the skin to transmit light pulses to the bio-implant and trigger expression of a target molecule. We have extended our criteria to include an 'on' signal and an 'off' signal, each encoded by different wavelengths and controlled by the duration of the pulse.

The Sensor Array

Blue light inhibits - BLUF Red light activates -