The Office of Naval Research (ONR) Synthetic Biology Program aims to develop transformational approaches to multiple naval application areas. Products will include living organisms with the capability to produce, deliver, detect and respond to compounds, or to provide command and control to nonliving miniaturized devices.
Secure and sustainable production of high-value materials, such as energetic materials or future naval fuels, may be achieved using synthetic biology. For example, both bacteria and plants have been engineered to use sugars, carbon dioxide and sunlight to produce intermediates for the production of TNT and TATB (triaminotrinitrobenzene, an aromatic explosive).
Living sentinel species have also been generated, which may allow ‘plug and play’ approaches for design of systems that can sense and respond to threats. The illustration above shows leaves of plants that have been programmed to respond to the detection of TNT vapor by turning white. The color change can be detected using remote spectral imaging systems.
Part of ONR’s program is centered on developing more of the synthetic biology tools needed to advance the field, such as methodology to produce large, multigene sequences, stimuli-responsive regulatory sequences and methods for rapidly adapting cells to perform new functions.
As ONR learns more about how living organisms work and how their functions are controlled at a genetic level, it will expand the repertoire of functions and pathways available for designing new organisms. Ultimately, engineered cells may be used to control and make decisions for a non-living nano or micro device through the cells’ processing of environmental information and translation into signals interpretable by that device.