From Multicellular Development to Morphogenetic Engineering to Synthetic Biology

9 juin 2015 à 14h30, Salle des Thèses, Nouveau Patio, site de l'Esplanade, Université de Strasbourg

René Doursat

Institut des Systèmes Complexes Paris Ile-de-France (ISC-PIF), Paris - France
Laboratoire BioEmergences, CNRS (USR 3695), Gif-sur-Yvette (Paris), France

Master Erasmus Mundus en Science des Systèmes Complexes, école Polytechnique, Palaiseau (Paris), France

From Multicellular Development to Morphogenetic Engineering to Synthetic Biology

René Doursat will present an overview of his work and collaborations linking (a) computational modeling in biology (i.e. understanding natural complex systems) to (b) bio-inspired computing in "artificial life" (i.e. creating technological complex systems) to (c) bio-engineering in synthetic biology (i.e. programming hybrid systems).

• (a) First, he will talk about *MecaGen*, an agent-based model and simulation platform of animal embryogenesis centered on the physicochemical coupling of cell mechanics with gene expression and molecular signaling.
• (b) Next, he will introduce *Morphogenetic Engineering*, a field taking its inspiration from biological development and evolution to create robotic, software or network architectures by decentralized self-assembly of elementary agents.
• (c) Finally, he will address synthetic biology, a rising discipline promoting the standardized manufacturing of biological components without natural equivalents. Here, the *SynBioTIC* project addresses a complex challenge: "shape engineering", which concerns the "redesign" of natural morphogenesis using realistic agent-based simulations of bacterial mats.

(a) Delile_Doursat_Peyrieras_2013_MecaGen_chapter.pdf
(b) Doursat_Sanchez_2014_mapdevo_SoRo.pdf
(c) Pascalie_et_al_2015_synbiotic_ECAL.pdf