CENTER FOR SYNTHETIC BIOLOGY

MolES Seminar - Winter 2025_Dr. Ben Woolston_Engineering bacteria to solve problems in renewable chemical production and human health
2025-01-14 13:00 - 14:00 UTC | NanoES 181
Engineering bacteria to solve problems in renewable chemical production and human health
Dr. Ben Woolston
Assistant Professor, Chemical Engineering
Northeastern University
Abstract: The synthetic biology revolution has given us the ability to genetically reprogram microbes to serve a wide variety of purposes, from miniscule chemical factories that orchestrate exquisitely selective enzymatic pathways to produce fuels, pharmaceuticals and polymers, to biological computers that can sense their chemical environment and implement complex decision-making algorithms. The overall goal of the Woolston lab is to harness this potential for applications in renewable energy production and the human gut microbiota. This talk will present an overview of the two major current thrusts of the lab: In the first, we are engineering anaerobic bacteria for the conversion of renewable single-carbon feedstocks to biofuels, taking advantage of a number of economic and ethical benefits of using these substrates compared to 1st and 2nd generation biofuel efforts. In the second, we are developing engineered microbes that can sense and modulate the levels of disease-associated metabolites in the human gut, with an initial focus on hydrogen sulfide; a toxic, volatile molecule implicated in the onset of IBD and colorectal cancer. As well as the exciting applied potential of the resultant technology, these efforts provide us with model systems with which to ask broader fundamental questions about microbial metabolism

Synbio Supergroup Meeting_Claudia Vasquez (Dept of Biochemistry)
2025-01-06 13:30 - 14:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | MolES 215
Monthly ‘Supergroup’ Seminars have featured >100 graduate student and faculty presenters from UW and beyond. All students, postdocs, research scientists, and faculty are welcome and encouraged to sign up to present. These meetings are a great informal venue to brainstorm new ideas, get feedback on preliminary results, practice for oral exams and job talks, and just share your cool science with the broader UW/Seattle SynBio community!
MolES 215 and on zoom https://washington.zoom.us/j/94024270390

Synbio Supergroup Meeting_Hayden Henry (Zalatan/Klevit) and Tommy G. Primo (Carothers)
2024-12-02 13:30 - 14:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | MolES 215
Hybrid Monthly ‘Supergroup’ Seminars have featured >100 graduate student and faculty presenters from UW and beyond. All students, postdocs, research scientists, and faculty are welcome and encouraged to sign up to present. These meetings are a great informal venue to brainstorm new ideas, get feedback on preliminary results, practice for oral exams and job talks, and just share your cool science with the broader UW/Seattle SynBio community!

MolES 215 and on zoom https://washington.zoom.us/j/94024270390

MolES Seminar: Brian Pfleger (Chemical & Biological Engineering - University of Madison-Wisconsin)
2024-11-19 13:00 - 14:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | NanoES 181
The Molecular Engineering & Sciences Institute hosts a weekly seminar that brings together students, faculty and distinguished leaders from various disciplines across campus to explore current trends in molecular engineering and nanotechnology. This week’s MolES Seminar presenter is Brian Pfleger (Chemical & Biological Engineering – University of Madison-Wisconsin).

Genome Sciences Seminars_Dr. Kyle Loh | Stanford University
2024-11-13 15:30 - 16:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | Foege Auditorium (Foege S-060
UW Genome Sciences brings leading researchers from a broad spectrum of scientific areas to campus to discuss the latest advances in genetics, genomics, proteomics, computational research and related emerging tools and technologies.

ChemE Graduate Seminar Series_Wilfred Chen_Gore Professor of Chemical Engineering, University of Delaware
2024-11-05 09:00 - 10:00 (America/Los_Angeles)
Wilfred Chen
Gore Professor of Chemical Engineering,
Interim Associate Dean for Research and Entrepreneurship,
University of Delaware
November 5
Lecture 9:00 – 9:50 a.m. | JHN 075
Reception 10:00 -11:00 a.m. | BNS 109
Abstract
Inspired by the remarkable ability of natural protein switches to sense and respond to a wide range of environmental queues, here we reported new strategies to engineer synthetic protein switches to dynamically organize proteins with highly diverse and complex architectures. This new framework can be used to dynamically control the spatial proximity and the corresponding functions of different proteins for both in vitro and in vivo applications. The general utility of the strategy was used to perform Boolean logic operations to provide explicit control of protein function using multi-input, reversible, and amplification architectures suitable for a wide range of applications.
Bio
Professor Wilfred Chen joined the University of Delaware on January 1, 2011 as the Gore Professor of Chemical Engineering. He obtained his B.S. degree from UCLA in 1988 and his Ph.D. from Caltech in 1993, both in Chemical Engineering. After a one-year postdoc in Switzerland, he joined UC Riverside in 1994. He was Professor of Chemical and Environmental Engineering and the holder of the Presidential Chair until he joined the University of Delaware in 2011. His research interests are in Synthetic Biology and Protein Engineering. Professor Chen has published more than 290 journal papers and delivered over 100 invited lectures. He serves on the editorial board for many scientific publications, including: Applied and Environmental Microbiology and Biotechnology and Bioengineering. He is also the editor/associate editor for the Biochemical Engineering Journal, Biotechnology Journal, and AICHE Journal. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE).
Professor Chen has also received numerous awards, including: the NSF Career Award, AIChE Food, Pharmaceutical, and Bioengineering Division 15c Plenary Lecture, Biotechnology Progress Award for Excellence in Biological Engineering Publication, Daniel I.C. Wang Award for Excellence in Biochemical Engineering from AICHE/SBE, Marvin J. Johnson Award in Microbial & Biochemical Technology from ACS, and the AICHE Food, Pharmaceutical & the Bioengineering Division Award.

Synbio Supergroup Meeting_Nick Kaplan (Marchand)
2024-11-04 13:30 - 14:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | MolES 215
