Researchers Create First-Ever 'Designer Chromosome' in Yeast

Researchers have now created the world's first synthetic functional chromosome in yeast. The work of this synthesis of the eukaryotic chromosome was done by researchers at NYU Langone Medical Center's Institute for Systems Genetics. This new chromosome is called SynIII and has approximately 273,871 base pairs of DNA compared to the 316,667 base pairs present in biological yeast. Researchers said certain parts of the chromosome that were considered unnecessary such as repeating segments of the DNA, junk DNA and jumping genes were all removed during the synthesis of the chromosome.

The team of researchers had transferred the artificial chromosome in a living yeast cell and found that it works just like a normal chromosome. Jef Boeke, PhD, director of NYU Langone Medical Center's Institute for Systems Genetics, said, "It is the most extensively altered chromosome ever built. But the milestone that really counts is integrating it into a living yeast cell. We have shown that yeast cells carrying this synthetic chromosome are remarkably normal. They behave almost identically to wild yeast cells, only they now possess new capabilities and can do things that wild yeast cannot."

The next step in the research is to synthesize larger chromosome and maybe construct an artificial genome of an organism. The designer chromosome has a few different applications. It can be used to improve production of alcohol, butanol, and biodiesel. In Pharmaceutical industry, bugs with artificial chromosomes could produce drug components, according to the researchers.