Credit: ACS Synth. Biol. 2022, 11, 3, 1040–1048
Researchers have shown that it is possible to transfer biochemical information logically from genetically engineered bacterial cells to specific human cancer cells1.
The bacterial cells generated the information by sensing and computing specific chemical inputs. The cells were then able to transfer the information to the cancer cells, stopping the activity of specific genes.
Such cellular computing may have applications in programmed therapeutics and drug-delivery systems, says a team at the Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics (SINP) in Kolkata.
Physicist Richard Feynman predicted that biochemical reactions in a living cell could be harnessed to do reversible computing which would consume less power than a conventional computer.
The scientists at SINP created a Feynman logic gate, using single cells of Escherichia coli and two chemicals that acted as inputs. Sensing and computing the chemical inputs, the bacteria grew and generated outputs as two light-emitting proteins.
Next, the researchers made a circuit using the bacterial cells and cancer cells. One part of the circuit computed the chemical inputs. The other helped the bacteria to invade the cancer cells. A specific form of RNA molecules replaced the output-producing proteins.
Armed with the RNA molecules, the bacteria invaded the cancer cells where they silenced two target genes. This gene silencing was regarded as output. The experiments, supported by a mathematical model, demonstrated that the circuit was ultrasensitive and ‘digital-like’.
Such a circuit may be used to develop cellular hardware for energy-efficient computing with no information loss, the researchers say.
