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Research

Biological systems - including the simplest cells - exhibit a broad range of functions to thrive in their environment. Research in the Imperial College Centre for Synthetic Biology is focused on the possibility of engineering the underlying biochemical processes to solve many of the challenges facing society, from healthcare to sustainable energy. In particular, we model, analyse, design and build biological and biochemical systems in living cells and/or in cell extracts, both exploring and enhancing the engineering potential of biology.

As part of our research we develop novel methods to accelerate the celebrated Design-Build-Test-Learn synthetic biology cycle. As such research in the Centre for Synthetic Biology highly multi- and interdisciplinary covering computational modelling and machine learning approaches; automated platform development and genetic circuit engineering ; multi-cellular and multi-organismal interactions, including gene drive and genome engineering; metabolic engineering; in vitro/cell-free synthetic biology; engineered phages and directed evolution; and biomimetics, biomaterials and biological engineering.

Publications

Citation

BibTex format

@article{Blount:2016:10.1038/srep26863,
author = {Blount, BA and Driessen, MRM and Ellis, T},
doi = {10.1038/srep26863},
journal = {Scientific Reports},
title = {GC Preps: Fast and Easy Extraction of Stable Yeast Genomic DNA},
url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep26863},
volume = {6},
year = {2016}
}

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RIS format (EndNote, RefMan)

TY  - JOUR
AB  - Existing yeast genomic DNA extraction methods are not ideally suited to extensive screening of colonies by PCR, due to being too lengthy, too laborious or yielding poor quality DNA and inconsistent results. We developed the GC prep method as a solution to this problem. Yeast cells from colonies or liquid cultures are lysed by vortex mixing with glass beads and then boiled in the presence of a metal chelating resin. In around 12 minutes, multiple samples can be processed to extract high yields of genomic DNA. These preparations perform as effectively in PCR screening as DNA purified by organic solvent methods, are stable for up to 1 year at room temperature and can be used as the template for PCR amplification of fragments of at least 8 kb.
AU  - Blount,BA
AU  - Driessen,MRM
AU  - Ellis,T
DO  - 10.1038/srep26863
PY  - 2016///
SN  - 2045-2322
TI  - GC Preps: Fast and Easy Extraction of Stable Yeast Genomic DNA
T2  - Scientific Reports
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep26863
UR  - http://hdl.handle.net/10044/1/33164
VL  - 6
ER  -

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