Team:Grenoble/Biology/Network

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iGEM Grenoble 2012

Project

Network details

Our system is divided in two modules:
  • signaling module
  • amplification module

Signaling module

The signaling module allows our bacterial strain to integrate the input signal = the pathogene presence.

Stapylococcus aureus secrete a protease nom de la protéase which cut a specific amino-acids sequence. This specific sequence can be used as a linker between a membrane protein and a dipeptide.
Once S. aureus is present, the linker is cut by the protease and the dipeptide is released.

The dipeptide binds to his receptor which is an engineered receptor:
  • the extracellular part is the extracellular part of Tap, a dipeptide receptor involved in the chemotaxism
  • the intracellular part is the intracellular part of EnvZ, a kinase involved in the osmoregulation

Once the dipeptide is bound, the EnvZ part allows the phosphorylation of OmpR, a transcriptional activator.

Amplification module

The amplification module allows our bacterial strain to amplify the input signal and to produce an output signal = fluorescence.

Internal amplification


Once OmpR is phosphorylated, it allows the production of adenyl cyclase by activating the OmpC promoter.
Adenyl cyclase is an enzyme which catalyse the conversion of ATP (Adenosine Tri-Phosphate) to cAMP (cyclic Adenosine Mono-Phosphate).


cAMP binds to CRP (C-reactive protein) and then this complex allows the production of AraC by activating the pMalT promoter.
In the presence of arabinose, AraC, with cAMP-CRP, activates the pAraBAD promoter, forming thus an "AND" gate, which allow the production of:
  • adenyl cyclase which reproduce cAMP, forming thus an amplification loop
  • GFP (Green Fluorescent Protein) = our output signal

External amplification

When one bacterium detecte S. aureus, it produces a lot of GFP and cAMP. cAMP can diffuse through the membrane and activates the amplification loop in all the neighbourings bacteria which can thus produce a lot of GFP and cAMP.
The result is an entire population which produce GFP whereas only one bacterium has detected the pathogen in the first place.