Christopher Voigt Explained

Christopher A. Voigt
Birth Place:	Ann Arbor, Michigan
Citizenship:	U.S.
Nationality:	U.S.
Field:	Synthetic Biology, Biotechnology, Genetic Engineering, Biological Engineering
Work Institution:	Massachusetts Institute of Technology, UCSF
Alma Mater:	University of Michigan California Institute of Technology University of California - Berkeley
Doctoral Advisor:	Zhen-Gang Wang, Frances Arnold, Stephen Mayo, Adam P Arkin (Postdoctoral)

Christopher Voigt is an American synthetic biologist, molecular biophysicist, and engineer.^{[1] [2]}

Career

Voigt is the Daniel I.C. Wang Professor of Advanced Biotechnology in the Department of Biological Engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He works in the developing field of synthetic biology. He is the co-director of the Synthetic Biology Center^[3] at MIT and the co-founder of the MIT-Broad Foundry.^{[4] [5]}

His research interests focus on the programming of cells to perform coordinated and complex tasks for applications in medicine, agriculture, and industry. His works include:

• Design of genetic circuits in bacteria, yeast and mammalian cells.^{[6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12]} Encoded in DNA, these circuits implement computational operations inside of cells.
• Software to program living cells (Cello), which is based on principles from electronic design automation and is based on Verilog.^{[13] [14]}
• Genetically encoded sensors that enables cells to respond to chemicals, environmental cues, and colored light.^{[15] [16] [17] [18]}
• Computational tools to design precision genetic parts, based on biophysics, bioinformatics, and machine learning.^{[19] [20]}
• Therapeutic bacteria to navigate the human body and identify and correct disease states.^{[21] [22]}
• Redesign of the nitrogen fixation gene cluster to facilitate its transfer between organisms and control with synthetic sensors and circuits.^{[23] [24]}
• Pharmaceutical discovery from large databases of DNA sequences, including the human gut microbiome, though high-throughput pathway recoding and DNA synthesis.^{[25] [26]}
• Harnessing cells to produce materials, including spider silk, nylon-6, and DNA nanomaterials.^{[27] [28] [29]}

In addition, he is the:

• Founding Member of the National Science Foundation-funded Synthetic Biology Engineering Research Center (SynBERC),^[30] renamed the Engineering Biology Research Center (EBRC).^[31]
• Editor-in-Chief of ACS Synthetic Biology.^[32]
• Co-founder of the companies Asimov^[33] (cellular programming) and Pivot Biotechnologies^[34] (agriculture).
• Co-founder of the Synthetic Biology: Engineering Evolution and Design (SEED) Conference Series.^[35]
• Chair of the SAB for the Dutch chemical company DSM.

His former students have founded Asimov^[36] (mammalian synthetic biology), De Novo DNA^[37] (computational design), Bolt Threads^[38] (spider silk-based textiles), Pivot Bio^[39] (agriculture), and Industrial Microbes^[40] (methane consuming organisms).

External links

• Official Group Website
• ACS Editor Profile
• SB7.0 Talk: Foundational Tools & Engineering
• Synthetic Biology: Programming Living Bacteria
• Decoding Synthetic Biology
• Engineering Biology

Notes and References

1. Your Cheat-Sheet Guide to Synthetic Biology. Jacob. Brogan. Slate . 3 April 2017. Slate.
2. Five hard truths for synthetic biology. Roberta. Kwok. 20 January 2010. 463. 7279. 288–290. 10.1038/463288a. 20090726. Nature. free.
3. Web site: MIT Synthetic Biology Center.
4. Web site: MIT-Broad Foundry.
5. Web site: DARPA Gives MIT Lab $32 Million To Program Living Cells . . 2015 . September 30, 2015.
6. Tamsir A, Tabor JJ, Voigt CA. Robust multicellular computing using genetically encoded NOR gates and chemical 'wires'. Nature . 469 . 7329. 212–5 . 2011 . 21150903 . 10.1038/nature09565. 3904220. 2011Natur.469..212T.
7. Lou C, Stanton BC, Chen YJ, Munsky B, Voigt CA. Ribozyme-based insulator parts buffer synthetic circuits from genetic context . Nature Biotechnology. 30 . 11 . 1137–42 . 2012 . 23034349 . 10.1038/nbt.2401 . 3914141 .
8. Brophy JA, Voigt CA . Principles of genetic circuit design . Nature Methods . 11 . 5. 508–20 . 2014 . 24781324 . 10.1038/nmeth.2926 . 4230274 .
9. Yang L, Nielsen AA, Fernandez-Rodriguez J, McClune CJ, Laub MT, Voigt CA . Permanent genetic memory with >1-byte capacity . Nature Methods . 11 . 12. 1261–6 . 2014 . 25344638 . 10.1038/nmeth.3147 . 4245323 .
10. Moon TS, Lou C, Tamsir A, Stanton BC, Voigt CA . Genetic programs constructed from layered logic gates in single cells . Nature . 491 . 7423. 249–53 . 2012 . 10.1038/nature11516 . 3904217 . 23041931. 2012Natur.491..249M .
11. Anderson JC, Voigt CA, Arkin AP . Environmental signal integration by a modular AND gate . Mol. Syst. Biol. . 3 . 1. 133 . 2007 . 17700541 . 10.1038/msb4100173 . 1964800.
12. Web site: A programming language for living cells. Phys.org. March 31, 2016.
13. Web site: Cello Software .
14. Nielsen AA, Der BS, Shin J, Vaidyanathan P, Paralanov V, Strychalski EA, Ross D, Densmore D, Voigt CA. Genetic circuit design automation. Science . 352 . 6281 . 2016 . 27034378 . 10.1126/science.aac7341 . aac7341. free .
15. Fernandez-Rodriguez J, Moser F, Song M, Voigt CA. Engineering RGB color vision into Escherichia coli . Nature Chemical Biology . 13 . 7 . 706–8 . 2017 . 28530708 . 10.1038/nchembio.2390.
16. Levskaya A, Weiner OD, Lim WA, Voigt CA . Spatiotemporal control of cell signalling using a light-switchable protein interaction . Nature . 461 . 7266 . 997–1001. 2009 . 19749742 . 10.1038/nature08446 . 2989900 . 2009Natur.461..997L .
17. Levskaya A, Chevalier AA, Tabor JJ, Simpson ZB, Lavery LA, Levy M, Davidson EA, Scouras A, Ellington AD, Marcotte EM, Voigt CA . Synthetic biology: engineering Escherichia coli to see light . Nature . 438 . 7067 . 441–2 . 2005 . 16306980 . 10.1038/nature04405. 2005Natur.438..441L . 4428475 .
18. Stanton BC, Nielsen AA, Tamsir A, Clancy K, Peterson T, Voigt CA. Genomic Mining of Prokaryotic Repressors for Orthogonal Logic Gates . Nat Chem Biol . 10 . 2 . 99–105 . 2014 . 4165527 . 10.1038/nchembio.1411 . 24316737.
19. Chen YJ, Liu P, Nielsen AA, Brophy JA, Clancy K, Peterson T, Voigt CA. Characterization of 582 natural and synthetic terminators and quantification of their design constraints . Nature . 10 . 7 . 659–64. 2013 . 23727987 . 10.1038/nmeth.2515 . 205421681 .
20. Salis H, Mirsky E, Voigt CA . Automated Design of Synthetic Ribosome Binding Sites to Precisely Control Protein Expression . Nature Biotechnology . 27 . 10 . 946–50. 2009 . 10.1038/nbt.1568. 2782888 . 19801975.
21. Anderson JC, Clarke EJ, Arkin AP, Voigt CA. Environmentally Controlled Invasion of Cancer Cells by Engineered Bacteria . Journal of Molecular Biology . 355 . 4 . 619–27. 2006 . 10.1016/j.jmb.2005.10.076. 16330045 . 10.1.1.161.6839 .
22. Mimee M, Tucker A, Voigt CA, Lu TK. Programming a Human Commensal Bacterium, Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron, to Sense and Respond to Stimuli in the Murine Gut Microbiota. Cell Systems . 1 . 1 . 62–71. 2015 . 10.1016/j.cels.2015.06.001. 4762051 . 26918244.
23. Temme K, Zhao D, Voigt CA. Refactoring the nitrogen fixation gene cluster from Klebsiella oxytoca. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. . 109 . 18 . 7085–7090. 2012 . 10.1073/pnas.1120788109. 3345007 . 22509035. 2012PNAS..109.7085T. free.
24. Smanski MJ, Bhatia S, Zhao D, Park Y, Woodruff LB, Giannoukos G, Ciulla D, Busby M, Calderon J, Nicol R, Gordon DB, Densmore D, Voigt CA. Functional optimization of gene clusters by combinatorial design and assembly. Nature Biotechnology . 32 . 12 . 1241–9. 2014 . 10.1038/nbt.3063. 25419741 . 6527069.
25. Smanski MJ, Zhou H, Claesen J, Shen B, Fischbach MA, Voigt CA . Synthetic biology to access and expand nature's chemical diversity. Nat Rev Microbiol. 14. 3. 2016. 26876034 . 10.1038/nrmicro.2015.24. 5048682 . 135–149.
26. Temme K, Zhao D, Voigt CA. Refactoring the nitrogen fixation gene cluster from Klebsiella oxytoca. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. . 109. 18. 7085–7090. 2012. 10.1073/pnas.1120788109. 3345007. 22509035. 2012PNAS..109.7085T. free.
27. Widmaier DM, Tullman-Ercek D, Mirsky EA, Hill R, Govindarajan S, Minshull J, Voigt CA. Engineering the Salmonella type III secretion system to export spider silk monomers. Mol Syst Biol. 5 . 309 . 309. 2009 . 10.1038/msb.2009.62. 2758716. 19756048 .
28. Zhou H, Vonk B, Roubos JA, Bovenberg RA, Voigt CA. Algorithmic co-optimization of genetic constructs and growth conditions: application to 6-ACA, a potential nylon-6 precursor. Nucleic Acids Res. 43 . 21 . 10560–70. 2015 . 10.1093/nar/gkv1071. 26519464. 4666358 .
29. Elbaz J, Yin P, Voigt CA. Genetic encoding of DNA nanostructures and their self-assembly in living bacteria. Nature Communications. 7. 11179. 2016 . 10.1038/ncomms11179. 27091073. 4838831. 2016NatCo...711179E.
30. Web site: Synberc.
31. Web site: Ebrc.
32. Web site: ACS Synthetic Biology . ACS Publications.
33. Web site: Asimov . asimov.io .
34. Web site: PivotBio.
35. Web site: Synthetic Biology: Engineering Evolution and Design (SEED). 2017-08-28.
36. Web site: Asimov - Intelligent Design.
37. Web site: De Novo DNA.
38. Web site: Bolt Threads.
39. Web site: Pivot Bio.
40. Web site: Industrial Microbes.