Detection of bioengineered organisms via genome sequencing and pan-genome analysis (FELIX). bacillus subtilis subtilis

Recent advances in genetic engineering has drastically increased the uses for recombinant engineering. New engineered organisms can now be created with few to no artifacts from the process. In order to identify organisms modified using these new methods, we are leveraging innovations in genomics, proteomics, and metabolomics to characterize the likelihood that a newly discovered organism either emerged from natural evolution or artificial engineering.The JCVI Synthetic Biology Group will design and build a training set of genetically engineered bacteria . The team will design and build a variety of genome modifications using published methods for genome engineering and crossing the spectrum of easy to difficult, if not impossible, to detect. All genetic alterations will be designed with the intent of changing the phenotype of the test organisms rather than making insignificant changes just to alter the genotype. To fully test the computational platforms we will simulate edited genomes/populations from all types of datasets: genome, expression, proteome, and metabolome. Both real and simulated genomes may be deposited under this BioProject.