Synthetic Yeast 2.0

Released: 12/5/2011 9:55 PM EST
Source: Johns Hopkins Medicine

Researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine who recently reported the design and creation of a man-made yeast chromosome have now signed on some international collaborators at BGI, a genomics company headquartered in Beijing, China. The newly formed relationship brings together the Johns Hopkins project with some of the world’s experts in so-called next generation genome sequencing in an effort to speed the understanding of how genomes are built and organized and how they function.

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November 14th, 2011, Shenzhen, China – BGI the world’s largest genomic organization and Johns Hopkins University (JHU), today signed a collaborative research agreement for the synthetic yeast project (SC2.0 PROJECT), an ambitious synthetic biology project which seeks to re-design and synthesize the yeast genome. This project was initiated by JHU and serves as part of JHU’s synthetic biology program.

In addition to the research collaboration of SC2.0 PROJECT, BGI’s researchers will have the opportunity to access the synthetic biology expertise of JHU. They can attend for internship the undergraduate course, “Build-A-Genome,” associated with the project at JHU. During the course, they can perform synthesis of segments of the synthetic yeast genome by themselves.

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In the quest to understand genomes—how they’re built, how they’re organized and what makes them work—a team of Johns Hopkins researchers has engineered from scratch a computer-designed yeast chromosome and incorporated into their creation a new system that lets scientists intentionally rearrange the yeast’s genetic material. A report of their work appears September 14 as an Advance Online Publication in the journal Nature.

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A Chinese-American entrepreneur whose company recently unveiled plans to build a hybrid auto plant in Alabama has made a $10 million gift to The Johns Hopkins University to promote innovative new approaches to the study of China.

The gift from Benjamin Yeung and his wife, Rhea, will establish the Benjamin and Rhea Yeung Center for Collaborative China Studies.

The center’s role is to deepen the understanding between the United States and China through a unique collaboration among the various Johns Hopkins schools and academic programs. In the near term, Johns Hopkins envisions new academic and research initiatives funded through Yeung Center grants for collaborative projects across the institution; the proposal process is expected to begin next month. The Hopkins-Nanjing Center for Chinese and American Studies, run jointly in China by Johns Hopkins and Nanjing University, will be a natural host for some of this activity.

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