Microbially derived biosensors for diagnosis, monitoring and epidemiology

Abstract

Living cells have evolved to detect and process various signals and can self-replicate, presenting an attractive platform for engineering scalable and affordable biosensing devices. Microbes are perfect candidates: they are inexpensive and easy to manipulate and store. Recent advances in synthetic biology promise to streamline the engineering of microbial biosensors with unprecedented capabilities. Here we review the applications of microbially-derived biosensors with a focus on environmental monitoring and healthcare applications. We also identify critical challenges that need to be addressed in order to translate the potential of synthetic microbial biosensors into large-scale, real-world applications.

Figure 1

Next‐generation microbially derived biosensors. Synthetic biology research is providing an increasing number of biological parts enabling custom ligand detection, advanced signal processing and reporter output. These parts can be differentially composed into corresponding modules according to design specifications dictated by the envisioned application. Depending on the application constraints, the synthetic system obtained can be implemented either in a whole‐cell biosensor or in a cell‐free system operating on paper.