Emphasis

This division supports projects developing and demonstrating new approaches to control/program biology for biomedical intervention, without preference for any particular disease or application. 

Emphasis in this program is on engineering new biochemical materials, sensors, actuators, and other parts and modules to interface and communicate with human biology and engineered systems for biomedical intervention. These parts and modules act as biotransducers to convert chemical energy into biological action. Projects should be directed toward overcoming a technological challenge that limits biomedical adoption. This program encourages projects that use a design-build-test approach.

Examples of biochemical parts and modules include but are not limited to:

• nucleases for genome editors
• toehold switches for synthetic genetic circuits
• transmembrane CARs for T-cells
• disordered protein compartments for intracellular communication 
• polymeric hydrogels for therapeutic devices
• nano-structured metal oxide surfaces for implant infection mitigation
• engineered viruses, exosomes, and nanoparticles for therapeutic agent delivery
• genome editors for DNA sequence manipulation

Additional emphasis

Additional emphasis in this program is on the development of screening and processing tools and the discovery of design principles to design, build, and test engineered biochemical modules. 

Notes

The development of integrated systems is supported by the Bionic and Robotic Systems program and Synthetic Biology and Biomimetic Systems program.