DNA
Factory Builds Up Steam
Six months since it launched, the world's
first factory for making professional-quality
biological DNA 'parts' is beginning to stock
its shelves. More than 60 people — academic
researchers, industry partners and interested
members of the community — joined the staff
at the International Open Facility Advancing
Biotechnology (BIOFAB), at a meeting on 19 and
20 July to discuss the facility's progress so
far and its aims over the next few years.
BIOFAB aims to supply synthetic biologists
with a collection of genetic parts that they
can use in their experiments. Biological parts
— actually sequences of DNA — should have
known and predictable functions, so they can
be inserted into cells to boost the production
of a particular protein, for example, or make
it sensitive to a specific toxin. BIOFAB has
begun to add some early attempts at parts
sequences to its registry. But there is still
some way to go before the fruits of BIOFAB's
labours can be useful to researchers, says
Drew Endy, the facility's director and a
synthetic biologist at Stanford University in
Palo Alto.