Agrobacterium was identified as the agent causing the plant tumor, crown gall over 100 years ago. Since then, studies have resulted in many surprising observations. Armin Braun demonstrated that Agrobacterium infected cells had unusual nutritional properties, and that the bacterium was necessary to start the infection but not for continued tumor development. He developed the concept of a tumor ...

We described preliminary work on designing a “robot engineer”. Somewhat similar to the idea of a robot scientist, the robot engineer is a closed-loop system that designs tools for a robot, and even complete robots, that are tested in simulation, manufactured and realised using 3D printing. The artefact is then evaluated on real-world tasks, feeding back to the original design. The system builds...

Exponential growth in digital information gathering, storage, and processing capabilities for biological data herald a new age of biology, when entire biological systems can potentially be understood. In order to facilitate human understanding of electronic components, the electronic design automation (EDA) industry has developed clean abstractions and design rules, enabling pervasive design re...

In article numer 20200081, Damia Mawad and co-workers highlight the importance of coupling conjugated polymers polyelectrolytes with lipid bilayer to engineer interfaces unique characteristics, facilitated by accessing properties each constituent material. Conjugated provide optical electronic properties, whereas mimics biological cell, enabling fusion cell membrane. The cover summarises how ut...

Hydrogels have been extensively used in various biomedical applications such as drug delivery and biosensing. More recently the ability to engineer the size and shape of biologically relevant hydrogels has generated new opportunities in addressing challenges in tissue engineering such as vascularization, tissue architecture and cell seeding. Here, we discuss the use of microengineered hydrogels...

The human body has an amazing ability to undergo self-repair. However, this natural regeneration process is limited, and in those patients with infection or disease, the body’s repair process may be compromised. To improve, maintain, or restore function to damaged or diseased tissues, scientists are looking to engineer tissue equivalents either as temporary substitutes while the body heals or a...