University of Florida SynBio Working group. Practicing & promoting microbial & plant #SynBio & metabolic engineering. 'Build-to-use' & 'Build-to-understand'
Joined March 2020
- Tweets 541
- Following 75
- Followers 248
- Likes 716
26 Photos and videos
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
Excited to share the Hanson Lab’s @ADHansonLab new preprint! We used OrthoRep to evolve Arabidopsis HDH, a short-lived enzyme, selecting variants with up to 20× higher abundance. Mutations boosted lifespan, catalytic efficiency, or inhibitor resistance.
🔗doi.org/10.1101/2025.07.01.6…
2
10
19
1,441
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
27 Jun 2025
Essential reading for everyone who has ever written, is writing, or will ever write an article that mentions nitrogen and agriculture in the same sentence.
27 Jun 2025
There's no way around it. Whether natural or synthetic, fixing nitrogen from air takes energy. That's one of the reasons N-fixers have not eliminated nitrogen scarcity.
csanr.wsu.edu/why-hasnt-biol…
2
21
1,710
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
11 Jun 2025
Thoughtful piece centered on ‘the fallacy of misplaced concretenes’ (mistaking abstractions for concrete realities). This fallacy can account for much, incl. #SynBio’s embrace of the ‘cells as circuit boards’ abstraction - which is useful but can be taken too far. @SynBio1
10 Jun 2025
The optimistic vision of abundance misses a crucial insight:
Society's struggles aren't rooted in poor governance or insufficient innovation, but in complexity itself.
LINK👇
artberman.com/blog/the-compl…
#energy #EnergyTransition #ClimateActionNow #renewables #solar #NuclearEnergy #globalwarming
#Psychology #BehavioralScience #HumanMind #CognitiveBehavioralTherapy #Neuroscience #CognitivePsychology #Philosophy #ArtificialIntelligence #AIResearch #MachineLearning
1
4
516
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
24 May 2025
Journals are just part of a system that incentivizes overselling end-to-end. But, as gatekeepers on the final products, they have agency. An editorial policy of “It’s complicated” falls short. Journals can ask for field trials to be done right & interpreted prudently.
3
2
8
809
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
21 May 2025
Automation surely has a place for routine tasks and low-cost robots democratize it. But I think there’s a real concern that expts will get designed so the hardware can handle them instead of in the best way to answer key questions. That would be the tail wagging the dog.
2
7
787
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
20 May 2025
If we want to Make America Healthy Again, it's not food dyes and trace chemistires. It is that most people fail to eat the foods we know fortify health. Shouldn't funding for research in fruit/veg production parallel medical investment? pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.25…
5
14
33
2,988
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
18 May 2025
I always tried to be clear about the distinction between “we make biology easier” and “biology is easy”
Not only because it was honest. It was also better marketing. Our customers were too smart to believe “biology is easy”
1
4
150
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
18 May 2025
Agreed, it's a really clear message. Good to see acknowledgement of reality at #3 'We still don't speak the language of biology'. Not too sure what that means for a company that pitches as being able to rewrite biology, but based on my 30 years at the GM coalface, it 100% true.
17 May 2025
Excellent reflection on #SynBio in a company context, and on the future of engineering biology.
1
2
8
761
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
17 May 2025
Hey plant synbio folks - Plant Physiology is now actively soliciting plant synbio papers. Get your manuscripts in! @PlantPhys
24 Jun 2022
@PlantPhys is v. much open for broadly plant-related #SyntheticBiology business! 3 expert new editors @Cyano_Dan @MatiZurbriggen @McCormick_Lab, plus submission option via @biorxivpreprint & a robust scooping policy ⬇️ Please RT to spread the word!
6
22
1,328
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
16 May 2025
Some of what this blog says is 💯 (falling cost of DNA sequencing & synthesis, low-cost robots…).
But title & much of the content are throwbacks to ~2005. The analogy with the digital revolution is appealing but misleading. #synbio learnt this & moved on.
blog.usv.com/you-can-just-pr…
1
2
376
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
16 Apr 2025
Exciting opportunity in @ADHansonLab!
16 Apr 2025
#SyntheticBiology postdoctoral position in our group @ufhorticulture in directed evolution of enzymes that underlie important crop traits ⬇️
3
7
1,144
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
5 Apr 2025
Sam Lovat, Elad Noor, Ron Milo run the numbers on #VerticalFarming to get ⚡️ cost ≈$10/kg dry plant matter.
Which explains why it's viable only for high-value 🥬
Vertical farming limitations & potential demonstrated by back-of-the-envelope calculations
doi.org/10.1093/plphys/kiaf0…
2
4
26
3,424
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
3 Mar 2025
🙏@NSF for supporting @UF_IFAS @ufhorticulture's trailblazing workshop 'How SynBio can *realistically* impact crop improvement & agriculture'! We brought🌱#SynBio ECRs together w/ top ag biotech & crop breeding experts to identify disconnects btwn their worlds & how to fix them⬇️
2
17
900
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
27 Feb 2025
💯 account of how synthetic gene circuits work & current status in 🌱🌱
But what are the
“myriad applications” relating to “the introduction of novel traits for improved agricultural productivity”?
Vague clichés may be prudent IP management - but in SynBio now they’re so passé.
27 Feb 2025
Happy to share our new review on plant synthetic circuits in @qpb_journal
We explore the latest advances & challenges in the field.
Huge thanks to @ry_lister for all the support!
#synbio #plants
3
10
729
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
24 Feb 2025
Useful references but otherwise uncritically recites typical ideas about what #SynBio & #AI *might perhaps one day* do in plant breeding⬇️Enough boosterism! Let's focus on *realistic, specific* applications & *numbers not adjectives* for projected benefits
doi.org/10.1016/j.xplc.2024.…
1
4
375
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
6 Jan 2025
For users of yeast OrthoRep or any continuous #DirectedEvolution system: After all accessible beneficial synonymous mutations have been made, synonymous ones that just boost expression dominate, creating improvement 'mirages'. Attests to OrthoRep's power! doi.org/10.1111/pbi.14563
1
22
67
7,589
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
6 Dec 2024
Are you an early-career SynBio researcher (PhD student/postdoc/Asst Prof) at a US institution & want your work to *really* help agriculture?
If so, this workshop is a great chance to learn & network. 30 places available, fully funded! Apply before Jan 15.
hos.ifas.ufl.edu/advertiseme…
5
50
96
16,743
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
18 Nov 2024
#SynBYSS #seminar with Prof Tobias Erb at Max-Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology & Prof Jaya Joshi at University of British Columbia
@jayajoshi20 @UBC @ADHansonLab @maxplanckpress @mpi_marburg
The talk video link is below
youtu.be/0PINT2cY1kU?si=grol…
5
18
1,159
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
16 Nov 2024
"Sucrose synthase (SUS) is a key enzyme that directly hydrolyses sucrose"
No. It's a glycosyltransferase. Reversibly cleaves suc to fruc UDP-/ADP-gluc.
If SUS inactivation is why "knockouts increased gluc &
fruc" why are there *zero data* on suc content?
doi.org/10.1038/s41586-024-0…
1
13
61
7,001
UF Synthetic Biology Working Group retweeted
16 Nov 2024
Interesting 2020 study from Bloom et al concluded that number of #maize genetics/breeding researchers rose 23-fold btwn 1969 & 2009 but rate of yield advance fell somewhat. What do these trends mean? And where do they end?
🙏@skdh for flagging the study!
doi.org/10.1257/aer.20180338
1
1
312