A central tenet of synthetic biology is that by “black-boxing” the complexity of biology, engineers will ultimately be able to manufacture many easy-to-use genetic devices that function as expected. SynBERC researchers reported a major step towards to this goal by publishing the first formalized datasheet for a standard biological device, as well as a generic process for developing many such devices and their accompanying datasheets. In the July 2008 issue of Nature Biotechnology, Barry Canton (MIT), Anna Labno (Berkeley) and Drew Endy (MIT) developed a first datasheet to concisely describe a cell-cell communication device’s inputs and outputs, its operating context, and its quantitative behavior.

“The datasheet is a concrete attempt to show what standardized biology might look like,“ said Barry Canton, a recent SynBERC PhD graduate and author of the paper. “In the example of our cell-cell communicator, the device input was homoserine lactone, and the device output was polymerase per second (PoPS). Using PoPs as a standard output signal permits any researcher to combine this device with other devices that accept a PoPS input.” Many such PoPs-accepting devices already exist in the Registry of Parts, and dozens of derivative systems using the communicator have already been assembled by iGEM teams around the world.

“It’s economically and socially important that we improve the efficiency, reliability, and predictability of our biological designs,” says fellow SynBERC researcher Adam Arkin in an accompanying editorial. He argues that the emerging standards for describing modular biological devices may lead to more efficient, predictable, and design-driven genetic engineering. Arkin and the paper authors concede the difficulties of developing biological standards in the near-term, such as questions about measurement methods, standard biological chassis, and growth conditions. But there was clear agreement that the abstraction of standardized, functional biological parts and their rules for composition is needed for biology to fully mature as an engineering discipline.

“However difficult and imperfect our standards may be,” Arkin states, “let’s push this idea to its limits and see where it will take us.”

Refinement and standardization of synthetic biological parts and devices
Barry Canton, Anna Labno, Drew Endy
Nature Biotechnology July 8, 2008
http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/v26/n7/abs/nbt1413.html

Setting the standard in synthetic biology
Adam Arkin
Nature Biotechnology July 8, 2008 (News & Views)
http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/v26/n7/abs/nbt0708-771.html