Team:Imperial College/Light

We have chosen light stimulus as our input for the Biofabricator. Light allows us to generate complex patterns with well defined edges, while gradients in wavelength and intensity will allow us to build up varying concentrations of biomaterial.

Photoreceptors and domains that were considered in our design include rhodopsins, phytochromes, LOV and BLUF. Of these, B. subtilis contains the blue light sensing protein YtvA which is related to the plant blue-light receptors phototropins. YtvA is a positive activator of the general stress transcription factor σB. Blue and not red light activates YtvA and thus induces σB activity. We could use σB which is expressed upon blue light illumination to activate the production of EpsE and hence control bacteria motility. However, there are other stressors which activate σB, hence we aim to make blue light the main activator of σB by controlling growth conditions and over expressing the YtvA receptor.

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1. New Insights into Metabolic Properties of Marine Bacteria Encoding Proteorhodopsins (Would be good if someone could decode what this paper is saying) [1]
2. Light powered E.Coli with Proteorhodopsin [2]
3. Blue Light Activates the σB -Dependent Stress Response of Bacillus subtilis via YtvA. Marcela A´ vila-Pe´rez, Klaas J. Hellingwerf, and Remco Kort*[3]
4. First Evidence for Phototropin-Related Blue-Light Receptors in Prokaryotes. Aba Losi, Eugenia Polverini, Benjamin Quest and Wolfgang Gartner [4]
5. Listening to the blue: the time-resolved thermodynamics of the bacterial blue-light receptor YtvA and its isolated LOV domain. Aba Losi, Benjamin Quest and Wolfgang Gärtner [5]
6. Photosensing in chemotrophic, non-phototrophic bacteria: let there be light sensing too Michael A. van der Horst, Jason Key, and Klaas J. Hellingwerf [6]