NEWS
November 2023
“The human gut is awash in a sea of microbes that quietly ferment fibers, produce vitamins, and exchange information with the immune system. Now, scientists are tasking bacteria with yet another job as they spelunk their way through the digestive system: cancer detection…”
August 2023
“The earlier you detect the presence of cancer, the better your chances are that treatments will work to completely eradicate it. That’s why researchers are constantly looking for better ways to make early detection of tumors possible. According to a new paper published in Science on Thursday, now there’s…”
August 2023
“Scientists from the University of California San Diego and their colleagues in Australia have created bacteria that can detect the presence of tumor DNA in a living organism. This innovative achievement is an insight into the development of revolutionary biosensors with the potential to…”
August 2023
“Colorectal cancer (CRC) remains the fourth leading cause of cancer death worldwide, and while the introduction of widespread screening has reduced mortality, current screening techniques have their drawbacks. While considered the gold standard for detecting precancerous polyps, colonoscopies are invasive…”
October 2021
“An engineered bacterium in the gut of an animal has successfully detected the presence of a specific DNA sequence for the first time. The approach could be used to create living sensors that provide early warnings of cancers or dangerous pathogens…”
July 2020
“Getting old is inevitable, but scientists at the University of California San Diego (UCSD) may be one step closer to being able to delay the aging process…”
July 2020
“Molecular biologists and bioengineers at UC San Diego isolated two distinct paths that cells travel during the aging process and engineered a new way to genetically program these processes to extend lifespan in yeast cells…”
July 2020
“News 8 covers a new study that helps unravel key mechanisms behind the mysteries of aging. UC San Diego researchers isolated two paths that cells travel during aging and engineered a new way to genetically program these processes to extend life. Biological Sciences Associate Professor Nan Hao is interviewed…”
June 2020
“The ability to detect the growth of a bacterial colony by monitoring changes in impedance across time reflects the impressive scientific progress connecting bacterial behavior with electrodes via synthetic biology. In a new report, M. Omar Din and a research team at the BioCircuits Institute…”
March 2020
“A pioneer of synthetic biology at the University of California, San Diego, Jeff Hasty has spent his 20-year career designing strategies to make genetic circuits in engineered bacteria work together. But several years ago, Hasty had to admit that even he couldn’t outfox the humble bacterium Escherichia coli…”
March 2020
“Bioengineers at the University of California San Diego have redesigned how harmless E. coli bacteria “talk” to each other. The new genetic circuit could become a useful new tool for synthetic biologists who, as a field, are looking for ways to better control the bacteria they engineer to perform all sorts of tasks…”
March 2020
“Bioengineers at the University of California San Diego have redesigned how E. coli bacteria communicate with each other. This could now help them better control the bacteria they engineer for specific purposes and tasks…”
March 2020
“We harnessed the potential of an atypical bacterial communication system to engineer precise single and multi-population dynamics…”
February 2020
“When it comes to testing drinking water for dangerous contaminants, such as heavy metals like lead or cadmium, continuous testing directly from faucets people drink from is important. Yet, very little of this kind of water testing is done. A team from UC San Diego…”
February 2020
“It’s not always easy to tell if the water you’re drinking is safe. Some ways to check include lab testing and filters. And soon it could include E. coli bacteria. San Diego scientists are developing a new bacteria-based water sensing technology…”
January 2020
“Microbial communities inhabit every ecosystem on Earth, from soil to rivers to the human gut. While monoclonal cultures often exist in labs, in the real world, many different microbial species inhabit the same space. Researchers at University of California San Diego have discovered…”
January 2020
“Pop a bacterium in a petri dish on an agar nutrient medium and it will go about its business, growing in its own special way. Escherichia coli grows pretty slowly but steadily in clumps. Acinetobacter baylyi, on the other hand, moves fast, spreading out in all directions until it covers the entire petri dish in 24 hours…”
January 2020
“In a series of experiments, a team of biologists at the University of California, San Diego studied the structure of growing colonies comprised of two species of rod-shaped bacteria, Escherichia coli and Acinetobacter baylyi; the researchers were surprised to see…”
January 2020
“E. coli has a bad reputation for causing infections that can result in all sorts of unpleasantness. Turns out there’s an undiscovered side to E. coli that makes it the Claude Monet of the bacteria world. Researchers at University of California San Diego discovered that mixing E. coli with A. baylyi bacteria…”
September 2019
“Bioengineers and biologists at the University of California San Diego have developed a method to significantly extend the life of gene circuits used to instruct microbes to do things such as produce and deliver drugs, break down chemicals and serve as environmental sensors…”
September 2019
“Using a concept from a children’s game, UC San Diego synthetic biology scientists say they’ve found a new approach to make genetically engineered bacteria more suitable for delivering drugs for diseases such as cancer. While the method has been only demonstrated in cell cultures, work is now under way…”
September 2019
“Bacteria can be useful tools for expressing and deliver anti-cancer drugs, because they can be modified to carry non-native DNA and can colonize at tumor sites. However, such systems often stop working soon due to mutations that are driven by evolutionary selection…”