IGEM - What are biobricks? lyrics

In this video, you will learn about the standardized biological parts known as Biobricks, how to use the biobrick database, and general advice on designing your constructs for your iGEM project. Just as a reminder, BioBrick parts are standardized DNA sequences that can be used to design synthetic biology circuits in organisms like E. coli. Different biobrick parts include promoters, coding sequences, ribosomal binding sites, inverters, plasmid backbones, and terminator sequences. We use them in synthetic biology because they are standardized and easy to a**emble and rea**emble, using simple molecular biology techniques. If you want to learn more about these parts, you can find more information on each of these parts in the supplemental resources provided or in a molecular biology textbook. The BioBricks can be found in the open access Registry of Standard Biological Parts which was developed by researchers from MIT, Harvard and UCSF. In the registry, you can find information and characterization data on all the different parts, and also a catalogue which describes functions, performance, and design of each part. Every biobrick comes with a unique identification code to make searching for these parts easier. Most of the parts in the BioBricks registry are submitted by undergraduate students working on iGEM projects. It is important to keep in mind that a lot of parts lack some of the characterization data. There are also professional parts registries; one important one is the US based, public funded facility called the BIOFAB International Open Facility Advancing Biotechnology, and this contains more details about each part. Let us look at an example from the Paris Bettencourt 2014 iGEM team´s project. One of the sub projects aimed to create a library of odor-producing enzymes. In order to do this, we created several plasmid constructs using standard biobrick parts from the Registry of standard biological parts. One of the odors we were trying to produce was that of a banana! To do this, we found a biobrick, which contains the sequence of an enzyme that makes the smell of bananas. This biobrick, however, did not have a promoter to allow for the transcription of this enzyme. Therefore, we found another promoter from the Parts Registry and cloned the promoter upstream of the enzyme. This way, we could design a genetic device that had a promoter and a gene of interest and clone this into E. coli in order to successfully create an E. coli culture that smelled like bananas. Using these tools that are freely available to anyone, you too can start designing your biobricks and a**embling available biobrick parts into genetic devices and circuits.