Higher-Order Cellular Information Processing with Synthetic RNA Devices

TLDR

Engineering biological systems aims to address challenges in energy, food, environment, and health, and requires the ability to transmit and process information within cells to increase scale and complexity. The authors present a general method for assembling RNA devices that perform higher‑order cellular information‑processing operations from standard components. These RNA devices translate molecular inputs into targeted protein outputs, linking computation to gene expression and enabling control of cellular function. The devices act as logic gates (AND, NOR, NAND, OR) and signal filters, and display cooperativity.

Abstract

The engineering of biological systems is anticipated to provide effective solutions to challenges that include energy and food production, environmental quality, and health and medicine. Our ability to transmit information to and from living systems, and to process and act on information inside cells, is critical to advancing the scale and complexity at which we can engineer, manipulate, and probe biological systems. We developed a general approach for assembling RNA devices that can execute higher-order cellular information processing operations from standard components. The engineered devices can function as logic gates (AND, NOR, NAND, or OR gates) and signal filters, and exhibit cooperativity. RNA devices process and transmit molecular inputs to targeted protein outputs, linking computation to gene expression and thus the potential to control cellular function.