Biological Construction

When we started working on the E.calculus project, we thought : “how can we transpose an electronic device into a biological system?”
Looking to the diagramm of the electronic full adder, it can be divided into two parts : on the one hand the signals and on the other hand the logic gates. Indeed, logic gates will ever be the same, but signals must be adaptable to considered applications and microorganisms.

Input

For the input, it was needed to use a signal that can easily represents an “ON and OFF” switch. The use of lights to represent the inputs was our first idea : a blue and a red light.

Output

The output needed to be a signal that can be easily seen without any divice, something visual like a color.

Riboregulation System

In order to better control the expression of the recombinases, a ribo regulation system has been add before the recombinases genes.

Logic Gates

An electronic full adder is composed of 5 logic gates (2 XOR, 2 AND and 1 OR). To transpose these logic gates into biological gates, two publications published this year (2013) inspired us.

Carry

To represent the carry, a molecule that can transmit a message from one colony to an other was essential.

Full Adder

With a logic diagram, a full adder can be illustrated with 5 logic gates (2 XOR, 2 AND and 1 OR) A and B represent the two operands and Cin and Cout the carries. In our biological system, this diagramm represents the input part.