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Abstract:
Cellular reproduction is one of the fundamental hallmarks of life.
Therefore, the development of a minimal division machinery capable of
proper genome condensation and organization, mid-cell positioning and
segregation in space and time, and the final septation process
constitute a fundamental challenge for synthetic biology. It is
therefore important to be able to engineer such modules for the
production of artificial minimal cells. A bottom-up assembly of
molecular machines from bulk biochemicals complemented by in vivo
experiments as well as computational modelling helps to approach such
key cellular processes. Here, minimal functional modules involved in
genome segregation and the division machinery and their spatial
organization and positioning are reviewed, setting into perspective the
design of a minimal cell. Furthermore, the milestones of recent in vitro
reconstitution experiments in the context of cell division are discussed
and their role in shedding light on fundamental cellular mechanisms that
constitute spatiotemporal order is described. Lastly, current challenges
in the field of bottom-up synthetic biology as well as possible future
developments toward the development of minimal biomimetic systems are
discussed.
