Synthetic Biology: Clocks, Queues, and Crowds

Engineered biological circuits expressed in living cells are becoming increasingly attractive as a technology, with applications ranging from biofuel production to medical treatments.  A major goal in synthetic biology is to facilitate the rational design of biological circuits by discovering design principles.  In this talk, a brief background to synthetic biology will precede a discussion of three topics (synthetic oscillators, queueing systems, and multicellular environments) where such design principles have been explored by us.