(5bn) Synthetic Biology: An Evolving Field to Create New Biological Components and Systems

Synthetic organic chemists approach a synthesis scheme for a compound, based on the structure of the target compound. This retrosynthetic design is a powerful tool, giving organic chemists a lot of flexibility: a wide range of target products and a large set of possible synthetic steps. Despite this flexibility, chemical synthesis is not efficient when the target compounds are complex and have many functional groups. To synthesize these challenging compounds, biochemists and metabolic engineers have recruited enzymes and have shown the potential of these biocatalysts. However, most biosynthetic approaches have been made by utilizing ?forward biosynthesis,? a substrate-focused design of biological pathways, limiting the range of the target products. My research focuses on combining these two approaches: retrosynthesis and biocatalysis. Using tools of ?Synthetic Biology,? an evolving field involving the creation of new biological components and systems, I aim to create novel biosynthetic pathways for highly functionalized compounds. In addition, I seek to design and characterize interchangeable parts to build synthetic devices and systems that help to understand and to harness biological systems.