The art of vector engineering: towards the construction of next‐generation genetic tools

When recombinant DNA technology was developed more than 40 years ago, no one could have imagined the impact it would have on both society and the scientific community. In the field of genetic engineering, the most important tool developed was the plasmid vector. This technology has been continuously expanding and undergoing adaptations. Here, we provide a detailed view following the evolution of vectors built throughout the years destined to study microorganisms and their peculiarities, including those whose genomes can only be revealed through metagenomics. We remark how synthetic biology became a turning point in designing these genetic tools to create meaningful innovations. We have placed special focus on the tools for engineering bacteria and fungi (both yeast and filamentous fungi) and those available to construct metagenomic libraries. Based on this overview, future goals would include the development of modular vectors bearing standardized parts and orthogonally designed circuits, a task not fully addressed thus far. Finally, we present some challenges that should be overcome to enable the next generation of vector design and ways to address it.

• Publication year

  2018

• Venue

  Microbial Biotechnology

• Publication date

  2018-09-26

• Fields of study

  Biology, Medicine, Computer Science, Engineering

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1111/1751-7915.13318PMID 30259693PMCID 6302727
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar, PubMed

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

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