群体感应系统在合成生物学中的应用*

群体感应(quorum sensing, QS)是一种广泛存在于多种微生物中的胞间通信系统,细菌产生的自诱导物随着种群密度的增加而积累,诱导细菌对种群密度的响应,调节生物膜的形成或特定基因的表达。近年来,随着群体感应系统原理与关键元件的逐渐清晰,应用合成生物学手段进行多技术联合以及多系统间正交性设计具有极大的发展潜力,群体感应系统已成为合成生物学家动态调控胞间通信常用的重要手段之一。在群体感应是细胞-细胞间通信系统的基础上,对多种群体感应系统的联合设计在生物基化学品生产中自动化调控的研究进展进行综述;并针对群体感应系统在生物电化学转化领域实现双向生物信息交流的应用进行总结;同时归纳了医学领域中群体感应系统的动态调控功能与多种疾病诊断及治疗结合的研究进展,讨论了群体感应系统在多细胞通信和实际应用等方面的发展前景。

Applications of Quorum Sensing Systems in Synthetic Biology

Quorum sensing (QS) is an intercellular communication system found in many microorganisms. The autoinducers accumulate as the bacteria population grows. It can promote bacteria to acclimate current population density, regulate the formation of biofilm, and modulate the expression of specific genes. In recent years, researchers have been working on the principle of operation as well as the key elements of QS system and now we understand much more about them. These results would help us in designing a promising multi-system work using multiple methods of synthetic biology, and it can help researchers to take control of intercellular communication dynamically, which is particularly important. On the basis that quorum sensing is a cell-cell communication system, the research progress of the joint design of multiple quorum sensing systems in the automatic regulation of bio based chemicals production is reviewed. The application of quorum sensing system to realize two-way biological information exchange in the field of bioelectrochemical transformation is summarized. At the same time, this article summarizes the research progress of the combination of the dynamic regulation function of quorum sensing system and the diagnosis and treatment of various diseases in the medical field, and the expectation of development prospect.