MIT Scientists Engineer Bacteria into 'Living Transistors' for Biological Circuits

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have successfully transformed bacteria into functional 'transistors,' enabling the creation of biological circuits capable of performing basic computations and transmitting chemical signals. Published in Nature Chemical Biology, this breakthrough utilized the bacterium Pantoea agglomerans to develop two types of bacterial transistors and three relay strains. These biological systems, which transmit information via small chemical molecules, could eventually be integrated into plants to detect environmental stressors and trigger corrective responses.