Exploiting Resource Constraints for Controlling Biomolecular Circuits

Advances in synthetic biology depend on our ability to predictably engineer robust biomolecular systems in living cells. The functioning of these synthetic biomolecular systems requires the consumption of shared cellular resources, which imposes a gene expression burden that may impact the performance of the cell and the synthetic system. In this paper, we show the effect of resource constraints on quantitative and qualitative aspects of gene expression in multiple circuits. We utilise a resource-aware modelling framework to show that stabilization can be achieved in a class of integral controllers. The results open possibilities for the design of lean biomolecular controllers.