Abstract:
The present disclosure identifies pathways and mechanisms to confer improved industrial fitness on engineered organisms. It also discloses engineered organisms having improved industrial fitness. Synthetic biologic engineering modules are disclosed that provide for light capture, carbon dioxide fixation, NADH production, NADPH production, thermotolerance, pH tolerance, flue gas tolerance, salt tolerance, nutrient independence and near infrared absorbance. The disclosed engineered organisms can include one or more of these modules. Also provided are methods of using the engineered organism to produce carbon-based products of interest, biomass or pharmaceutical agents.
This is current science, with lots of money on it. Plenty of research groups are playing around with simpler genomes now with applications in mind. Synthetic Genomics is another company looking to do similar things. If Joule Bioltechnologies had not filed a patent for "highly engineered photosynthetic organisms", someone else WOULD have.
But the company's advisors are certainly impressive:
George Church, PhD
Professor of Genetics, Harvard Medical School; Director of the Center for Computational Genetics
Leading innovator in genetics
David Baker, PhD
Professor of Biochemistry, University of Washington
Specialist in protein design and engineering
Don Bryant, PhD
Pollard Professor of Biotechnology and Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Penn State University
Pioneer in photosynthetic organism biology
Jim Collins, PhD
Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Co-Director of the Center for BioDynamics, College of Engineering, Boston University
Leader in systems biology of microorganisms
Edward DeLong, PhD
Professor, Department of Biological Engineering and Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, MIT
Specialist in genomics of microorganism communities
Chaitan Khosla, PhD
Rauser-Petiprin Professor of Chemical Engineering, Stanford University
Founder, Kosan Biosciences
Specialist in bioorganic chemistry and metabolic engineering
Michael Laub, PhD
Assistant Professor of Biology, MIT
Specialist in biological cycles of microbes
Daniel Wang, PhD
Institute Professor, MIT
Founder, Biotechnology Process Engineering Center
Father of modern industrial biotechnology