Background
- The voltage output part of our project aims to mimic the signal transduction that occurs at a neural synapse.
- We are engineering E.coli to create a voltage output on detection of glutamate. This imitates the creation of a postsynaptic potential in a dendrite when a neurotransmitter (such as glutamate) is present at the synapse.
- The mechanism we have designed is similar to that used in the brain – relying on ion movement across the membrane, and gated ion channels.
- To simplify the concept, we are only regulating and measuring the flux of potassium (K+) ions, and we are using a directly glutamate-gated K+ ion channel.
- This means that on the binding of glutamate, the channels will open, allowing a K+ flux, which will change the voltage of the medium enough to be detected with a very sensitive electrode.
- In order to set up a large enough K+ concentration gradient across the membrane for ions to flow down when the channels open, cells are grown in high K+ medium (100mM) and resuspended in low K+ medium.
- However, E.coli also has a number of osmoregulatory systems which use relative K+ ion concentrations to control turgor. There are K+ leak channels (Kch and Kef) in the membrane, so we have chosen E.coli strains with mutations in these genes as our chassis.
Experiment Summaries
Electrical Output
Mutant Growth Rates
Cytoplasmic K+ Concentrations
Parts Construction:
Technical Information
Gene Design
Flame Photometer Calibration
OD600 (Cell Density) Calibration
Mutant Strains Information
Useful Links
Protein prediction tools
Uniprot database
Presentation
Literature
Kdp operon diagram
plasmid
The Kdp-ATPase system and its regulation
Potential Chassis: |Strain JW1242-1
Strain JW0710-1
Kdp mutant - paper from 1971
Worldwide E.coli Databases
Characterisation of kdpD - 2005
Investigations on Kdp Operon exp. & flux
Very interesting 2001 paper concerning Glutamate Channels
1999 paper on functional characterization of prokaryote Glu Channels
Sequenced Synechocystis PCC 6803 genome
Glutamate-gated K+ channel GluR0
Link to E.coli statistics page (CCDB Database)
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