Population-based Microbial Computing

Speaker: Martyn Amos, Manchester Metropolitan University

Abstract: Synthetic biology is an emerging research field, in which engineering principles are applied to natural, living systems. A major goal of synthetic biology is to harness the inherent "biological nanotechnology" of living cells for the purposes of computation, production, or diagnosis. As the field evolves, it is gradually moving away from a single-cell approach (akin to using standalone computers) to a distributed, population-based approach (rather like using networks of connected machines). In this talk we present several recent results from our group, describing various aspects of this new form of biological engineering. Specifically, we show, using computational studies, how reconfigurable logic devices may be constructed using bacteria, and how these may be used as the basis for a "client-server" model of microbial computing.