A PROTO-ORGANELLE IN OPERATION: Stimulation of a light sensor on the membrane of a proto-organelle (1) leads to the transport of lactose from the organelle to the main compartment of the protocell. (2) The increase in lactose concentration prompts the release of a transcriptional repressor, LacI, (3) and the subsequent expression of enhanced green fluorescent protein. (4)© GEORGE RETSECK
The development of synthetic cells is in its infancy, and researchers are tackling the challenge from two angles. They can either modify an existing single-cell organism—for example, a bacterium—or start from scratch and build a membrane-encapsulated protocell. One major improvement to the latter approach, accomplished by David Miller, a researcher at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute for Medical Research in Parkville, Australia, and his colleagues, is to add synthetic organelles.
“The advantage of using this bottom-up system is that you basically don’t have a lot of the evolutionary history of a living organism to get in the way of your design,” says Martin Hanczyc, a professor at the University of Southern Denmark, who was not involved in Miller’s work. “The concept is really nice.”
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