Design of Biological Systems

SYSTEMS BIOLOGY

GROUP LEADER:
Luis Serrano (ICREA Research Professor)

STAFF SCIENTISTS:
Christina Kiel (until 2017), Maria Lluch

POSTDOCTORAL FELLOWS:
Eva Yus, Raul Burgos, Carlos Pinero, Claire Lastrucci, Sarah di Bartolo, Leandro Radutsky, Martin Schaefer (staff scientist since December 2017), Marc Weber

PHD STUDENTS:
Carolina de Gallo, Daniel Shaw, Samuel Miravet, Ariadna Montero, Hannah Benisty, Veronica Llorens (finished October 2017)

TECHNICIANS:
Sira Martinez, Toni Ferrar , Violeta Beltran, Javier Delgado (Bioinformatician)

Summary

Our group is interested in the quantitative understanding and rational engineering of living systems (ranging from gene networks to organisms). For this purpose, we use a combination of tools that involve software for protein design and simulations of networks and experimental approaches. Our approach is based on first understanding a system and then engineering it to obtain the properties we want.  Our philosophy is also whenever possible identifying the possible practical applications for human health and biotechnology of our work.

Models of bacterial chromosome organization. Models of nucleoid organization with Ori and Ter represented by red and purple circles. (a) Model of the E. coli genome with the four macro-domains Ori, Ter, Left, Right, represented by circles in red, purple, pink and blue respectively. (b) Model of the B. subtilis genome adapted from(Berlatzky et al., 2008). (c) 3D models of the C. crescentus genome conformation(Umbarger et al., 2011). (d) 3D models of the M. pneumoniae genome conformation (Trussart et al., 2017)

Fig. 1

Models of bacterial chromosome organization. Models of nucleoid organization with Ori and Ter represented by red and purple circles. (a) Model of the E. coli genome with the four macro-domains Ori, Ter, Left, Right, represented by circles in red, purple, pink and blue respectively. (b) Model of the B. subtilis genome adapted from(Berlatzky et al., 2008). (c) 3D models of the C. crescentus genome conformation(Umbarger et al., 2011). (d) 3D models of the M. pneumoniae genome conformation (Trussart et al., 2017)

Research Projects

  • Quantitative understanding and whole-cell modelling of a whole organism: M. pneumoniae
  • Engineering of M. pneumoniae to treat human diseases.
  • Quantitative understanding of Signal Transduction in humans and its role in disease

Selected Publications

Crepieux PA, Poupon et al.
“A Comprehensive View of the beta-Arrestinome.”
Front Endocrinol (Lausanne), 8:32 (2017).

Stojanovski K, Ferrar T, et al.
“Interaction Dynamics Determine Signaling and Output Pathway Responses.”
Cell Rep, 19(1):136-149 (2017).

Trussart M, Yus E, et al.
“Defined chromosome structure in the genome-reduced bacterium Mycoplasma pneumoniae.”
Nat Commun, 8:14665 (2017).

Miravet-Verde S, Llorens-Rico V and Serrano L.
“Alternative transcriptional regulation in genome-reduced bacteria.”
Curr Opin Microbiol, 39:89-95 (2017).

Yus E, Yang JS, Sogues A and Serrano L.
“A reporter system coupled with high-throughput sequencing unveils key bacterial transcription and translation determinants.”
Nat Commun, 8(1):368 (2017).