%0 Journal Article
%T A Formalized Design Process for Bacterial Consortia That Perform Logic Computing
%A Weiyue Ji
%A Handuo Shi
%A Haoqian Zhang
%A Rui Sun
%A Jingyi Xi
%A Dingqiao Wen
%A Jingchen Feng
%A Yiwei Chen
%A Xiao Qin
%A Yanrong Ma
%A Wenhan Luo
%A Linna Deng
%A Hanchi Lin
%A Ruofan Yu
%A Qi Ouyang
%J PLOS ONE
%D 2013
%I Public Library of Science (PLoS)
%R 10.1371/journal.pone.0057482
%X The concept of microbial consortia is of great attractiveness in synthetic biology. Despite of all its benefits, however, there are still problems remaining for large-scaled multicellular gene circuits, for example, how to reliably design and distribute the circuits in microbial consortia with limited number of well-behaved genetic modules and wiring quorum-sensing molecules. To manage such problem, here we propose a formalized design process: (i) determine the basic logic units (AND, OR and NOT gates) based on mathematical and biological considerations; (ii) establish rules to search and distribute simplest logic design; (iii) assemble assigned basic logic units in each logic operating cell; and (iv) fine-tune the circuiting interface between logic operators. We in silico analyzed gene circuits with inputs ranging from two to four, comparing our method with the pre-existing ones. Results showed that this formalized design process is more feasible concerning numbers of cells required. Furthermore, as a proof of principle, an Escherichia coli consortium that performs XOR function, a typical complex computing operation, was designed. The construction and characterization of logic operators is independent of ˇ°wiringˇ± and provides predictive information for fine-tuning. This formalized design process provides guidance for the design of microbial consortia that perform distributed biological computation.
%U http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0057482