The University of Freiburg, officially the Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg, is a public research university located in Freiburg im Breisgau, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The university was founded in 1457 by the Habsburg dynasty as the second university in Austrian-Habsburg territory after the University of Vienna. Today, Freiburg is the fifth-oldest university in Germany, with a long tradition of teaching the humanities, social sciences and natural sciences and technology and enjoys a high academic reputation both nationally and internationally. The university is made up of 11 faculties and attracts students from across Germany as well as from over 120 other countries. Foreign students constitute about 18.2% of total student numbers.
Synthetic biology (SynBio) is a multidisciplinary field of science that focuses on living systems and organisms, and it applies engineering principles to develop new biological parts, devices, and systems or to redesign existing systems found in nature.
Tom Knight is an American synthetic biologist and computer engineer, who was formerly a senior research scientist at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, a part of the MIT School of Engineering. He now works at the synthetic biology company Ginkgo Bioworks, which he cofounded in 2008.
Andrew (Drew) David Endy is a synthetic biologist and tenured associate professor of bioengineering at Stanford University, California.
OpenWetWare is a wiki whose mission is "to support open research, education, publication, and discussion in biological sciences and engineering."
The International Max Planck Research School for Molecules of Life is a German centre for postgraduate training and research in life sciences. It is one among over 60 International Max Planck Research Schools in Germany. It is located in Munich and was established in 2005. The Ph.D. program is operated by the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry and works in close collaboration with the Max Planck Institute for Biological Intelligence and two universities in Munich.
BioBrick parts are DNA sequences which conform to a restriction-enzyme assembly standard. These building blocks are used to design and assemble larger synthetic biological circuits from individual parts and combinations of parts with defined functions, which would then be incorporated into living cells such as Escherichia coli cells to construct new biological systems. Examples of BioBrick parts include promoters, ribosomal binding sites (RBS), coding sequences and terminators.
Artificial gene synthesis, or simply gene synthesis, refers to a group of methods that are used in synthetic biology to construct and assemble genes from nucleotides de novo. Unlike DNA synthesis in living cells, artificial gene synthesis does not require template DNA, allowing virtually any DNA sequence to be synthesized in the laboratory. It comprises two main steps, the first of which is solid-phase DNA synthesis, sometimes known as DNA printing. This produces oligonucleotide fragments that are generally under 200 base pairs. The second step then involves connecting these oligonucleotide fragments using various DNA assembly methods. Because artificial gene synthesis does not require template DNA, it is theoretically possible to make a completely synthetic DNA molecule with no limits on the nucleotide sequence or size.
The California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences (QB3) is a nonprofit research and technology commercialization institute affiliated with three University of California campuses in the San Francisco Bay Area: Berkeley, San Francisco, and Santa Cruz. QB3's domain is the quantitative biosciences: areas of biology in which advances are chiefly made by scientists applying techniques from physics, chemistry, engineering, and computer science.
iLCD (Lighting Cell Display) is a device developed by a research team from Universidad Politecnica de Valencia, a MIT educated bioengineer, undergraduate students of the Universidad Politéctica de Valencia and Universitat de València and several members of the faculty and research staff from Universidad de València (Manuel Porcar), UPV (Pedro De Cordoba) and University of Malaga (Emilio Navarro).
The Registry of Standard Biological Parts is a collection of genetic parts that are used in the assembly of systems and devices in synthetic biology. The registry was founded in 2003 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The registry, as of 2018, contains over 20,000 parts. Recipients of the genetic parts include academic labs, established scientists, and student teams participating in the iGEM Foundation's annual synthetic biology competition.
Lynn Justine Rothschild is an evolutionary biologist, astrobiologist and synthetic biologist at NASA's Ames Research Center, and is an adjunct professor at Brown University. She is an Adjunct Professor at Stanford University, where she teaches Astrobiology and Space Exploration. At Ames, her research has focused on how life, particularly microbes, has evolved in the context of the physical environment, both on Earth and potentially beyond our planet's boundaries. Her research also explores the use of synthetic biology as an enabling tool for space travel. Since 2007, she has studied the effect of UV radiation on DNA synthesis, carbon metabolism and mutation/DNA repair in the Rift Valley of Kenya and the Bolivian Andes, and also in high altitude experiments atop Mount Everest, in balloon payloads with BioLaunch. She was the principal investigator of the first free-flyer synthetic biology payload which flew on the DLR EuCROPIS mission. In 2024, she received a Phase III NIAC grant to explore the use of fungi for constructing habitats on the Moon or Mars.
Terreform ONE is a 501c3 non-profit architecture and urban think tank that advances ecological design in derelict municipal areas. By formulating unsolicited feasibility studies and egalitarian designs, their mission is to illustrate speculative environmental plans for New York City and other cities worldwide. Their intention is to support community outreach and master plan solutions in underprivileged areas that do not have direct access to qualified architects and urban designers.
Synthetic biological circuits are an application of synthetic biology where biological parts inside a cell are designed to perform logical functions mimicking those observed in electronic circuits. Typically, these circuits are categorized as either genetic circuits, RNA circuits, or protein circuits, depending on the types of biomolecule that interact to create the circuit's behavior. The applications of all three types of circuit range from simply inducing production to adding a measurable element, like green fluorescent protein, to an existing natural biological circuit, to implementing completely new systems of many parts.
The Faculty of Biology is one of the eleven faculties of the University of Freiburg in Freiburg im Breisgau, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It is part of a strong life sciences network including institutions such as the Max Planck Institute of Immunobiology and Epigenetics, the Bernstein Center Freiburg (BCF), the Center for Applied Biosciences and the Center for Biological Systems Analysis, which started operations in 2008 as offspring of the Freiburg Initiative for Systems Biology (FRISYS), funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF).
Playing God was a 2012 BBC documentary in the Horizon series, hosted by Adam Rutherford. The documentary discusses synthetic biology, the potential of science "breaking down nature into spare parts" and then rebuilding it back up as we wish.
Roman Jerala is a Slovenian biochemist and synthetic biologist, internationally best known as the leader of Slovenian teams that won the Grand prize at the International Genetically Engineered Machine competition several times.
The Baltimore Underground Science Space (BUGSS) is a non-profit synthetic biology and biotechnology makerspace laboratory for science enthusiasts, hobbyists, and professionals to practice, share and learn about the biological sciences. BUGSS is closely aligned with do-it-yourself biology and the Maryland science community generally, and offers courses and lectures in addition to community lab space. It was founded by Dr. Tom Burkett in 2012. It is located in the Highlandtown neighborhood of Baltimore, Maryland.
Karmella Ann Haynes is a biomedical engineer and associate professor at the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology and Emory University. She researches how chromatin is used to control cell development in biological tissue.
Christina Maria Agapakis is a synthetic biologist, science writer. She is the Creative Director of the biotechnology company Ginkgo Bioworks.
