Search research articles

ABOUT JoVE

Overview Leadership Blog JoVE Help Center

AUTHORS

Publishing Process Editorial Board Scope & Policies Peer Review FAQ Submit

LIBRARIANS

Testimonials Subscriptions Access Resources Library Advisory Board FAQ

RESEARCH

JoVE Journal Methods Collections JoVE Encyclopedia of Experiments Archive

EDUCATION

JoVE Core JoVE Business JoVE Science Education JoVE Lab Manual Faculty Resource Center Faculty Site

Terms & Conditions of Use

Related Concept Videos

What is Cell Signaling?

What is Cell Signaling?

Despite the protective membrane that separates a cell from the environment, cells need the ability to detect and respond to environmental changes. Additionally, cells often need to communicate with one another. Unicellular and multicellular organisms use a variety of cell signaling mechanisms to communicate to respond to the environment.

What is Cell Signaling?

What is Cell Signaling?

Despite the protective membrane that separates a cell from the environment, cells need the ability to detect and respond to environmental changes. Additionally, cells often need to communicate with one another. Unicellular and multicellular organisms use a variety of cell signaling mechanisms to communicate to respond to the environment.

Overview of Cell Signaling

Overview of Cell Signaling

Despite the protective membrane that separates a cell from the environment, cells need the ability to detect and respond to environmental changes. Additionally, cells often need to communicate with one another. Unicellular and multicellular organisms use a variety of cell signaling mechanisms to communicate with the environment.
Cells respond to many types of information, often through receptor proteins positioned on the membrane. For example, skin cells respond to and transmit touch...

Contact-dependent Signaling

Contact-dependent Signaling

Contact-dependent signaling, as the name suggests, requires that communicating cells be in direct contact with each other. This is achieved either through receptor-ligand interactions or by specialized cytoplasmic channels that allow the flow of small molecules between cells. In animal cells, channels called gap junctions facilitate contact-dependent signaling in certain tissues, whereas, plasmodesmata perform a similar function in plants.
Gap Junctions
In animal cells, gap junctions are formed...

Autocrine Signaling

Autocrine Signaling

Autocrine signaling is one of the many signaling mechanisms that function inside multicellular organisms to carry out intercellular communication. In this type of signaling mechanism, the same cell that secretes an extracellular signaling molecule also expresses the receptors to bind and respond to that signaling molecule.
Autocrine Signaling in Macrophages
Under normal physiological conditions, autocrine signaling is essential for maintaining homeostasis. This process is well characterized in...

Yeast Signaling

Yeast Signaling

Yeasts are single-celled organisms, but unlike bacteria, they are eukaryotes (cells with a nucleus). Cell signaling in yeast is similar to signaling in other eukaryotic cells. A ligand, such as a protein or a small molecule released from a yeast cell, attaches to a receptor on the cell surface. The binding stimulates second-messenger kinases to activate or inactivate transcription factors that further regulate gene expression. Many of the yeast intracellular signaling cascades have similar...

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by

Same author

Toward a framework for risk mitigation of potential misuse of artificial intelligence in biomedical research.

Nature machine intelligence·2025

Same author

Confronting risks of mirror life.

Science (New York, N.Y.)·2024

Same author

Genome-wide transcription response of <i>Staphylococcus epidermidis</i> to heat shock and medically relevant glucose levels.

Frontiers in microbiology·2024

Same author

Engineering tRNA abundances for synthetic cellular systems.

Nature communications·2023

Same author

Colloidal Physics Modeling Reveals How Per-Ribosome Productivity Increases with Growth Rate in Escherichia coli.

mBio·2022

Same author

Direct and indirect impacts of synthetic biology on biodiversity conservation.

iScience·2022

Same journal

Platelet-derived biomaterials in osteoporosis: mechanisms, evidence and translational prospects.

Journal of biological engineering·2026

Same journal

Modular plug-and-play engineering of Klebsiella phages with dual receptor-binding proteins for efficient host range design.

Journal of biological engineering·2026

Same journal

Optimizing 3D-printed core-shell hydrogel system for probiotic protection: stability under in vitro digestion conditions and during storage.

Journal of biological engineering·2026

Same journal

Advanced nanobiosensors for the detection of neurovascular damage in cerebral infarction: prospects and challenges.

Journal of biological engineering·2026

Same journal

Ex vivo assay for organ-specific cancer cell invasion.

Journal of biological engineering·2026

Same journal

From coexistence to antagonism: nutrient- and temperature-dependent interactions between Bacillus atrophaeus JunSE1L and Pseudomonas chlororaphis O6 with implications for the wheat rhizosphere.

Journal of biological engineering·2026

See all related articles

Search research articles

Related Experiment Video

Updated: May 18, 2026

Simple, Affordable, and Modular Patterning of Cells using DNA

Simple, Affordable, and Modular Patterning of Cells using DNA

Published on: February 24, 2021

Engineered cell-cell communication via DNA messaging.

Monica E Ortiz¹, Drew Endy

¹Bioengineering Department, Stanford University, Y2E2 Room 269B, 473 Via Ortega, Stanford, CA, 94305-4201, USA. endy@stanford.edu.

Journal of Biological Engineering

|September 11, 2012

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Engineered bacteriophage M13 particles deliver DNA messages between bacteria, decoupling communication channels. This novel system enhances DNA messaging range and bit rates for programmed cellular behaviors.

More Related Videos

Epigenetic Engineering of K562 Cells: Dual-Vector Episomal Strategy for Stable Targeted DNA Methylation using dCas9-DNMT3A and -HDAC1 Fusion Proteins

Epigenetic Engineering of K562 Cells: Dual-Vector Episomal Strategy for Stable Targeted DNA Methylation using dCas9-DNMT3A and -HDAC1 Fusion Proteins

Published on: October 31, 2025

Non-Viral Engineering of Primary Human T Cells via Homology-Mediated End-Joining Targeted Integration of Large DNA Templates

Non-Viral Engineering of Primary Human T Cells via Homology-Mediated End-Joining Targeted Integration of Large DNA Templates

Published on: May 9, 2025

Related Experiment Videos

Last Updated: May 18, 2026

Simple, Affordable, and Modular Patterning of Cells using DNA

Simple, Affordable, and Modular Patterning of Cells using DNA

Published on: February 24, 2021

Epigenetic Engineering of K562 Cells: Dual-Vector Episomal Strategy for Stable Targeted DNA Methylation using dCas9-DNMT3A and -HDAC1 Fusion Proteins

Epigenetic Engineering of K562 Cells: Dual-Vector Episomal Strategy for Stable Targeted DNA Methylation using dCas9-DNMT3A and -HDAC1 Fusion Proteins

Published on: October 31, 2025

Non-Viral Engineering of Primary Human T Cells via Homology-Mediated End-Joining Targeted Integration of Large DNA Templates

Non-Viral Engineering of Primary Human T Cells via Homology-Mediated End-Joining Targeted Integration of Large DNA Templates

Published on: May 9, 2025

Area of Science:

Synthetic Biology
Microbial Engineering
Genetic Engineering

Background:

Organisms utilize genetically encoded cell-cell communication, which engineers are repurposing for programmed pattern formation and population-level behaviors.
Current engineered systems use specific small molecules for cell-cell communication, limiting information transmission to single messages like 'regulate transcription'.

Purpose of the Study:

To engineer a novel cell-cell communication platform using bacteriophage M13 gene products.
To demonstrate the autonomous packaging and delivery of heterologous DNA messages of varying lengths and encoded functions.
To decouple messages from a common communication channel and increase the range of engineered DNA messaging.

Main Methods:

Engineered a cell-cell communication platform utilizing bacteriophage M13 gene products.
Demonstrated autonomous transmission of various arbitrary genetic messages.
Linked message transmission/receipt to cellular chemotaxis to increase communication range across semisolid media.

Main Results:

Successfully engineered a platform for autonomous packaging and delivery of heterologous DNA messages using bacteriophage M13.
Decoupled messages from a common communication channel, enabling transmission of diverse genetic messages.
Enhanced DNA messaging range by linking transmission/receipt to bacterial chemotaxis, improving transmission distance and bit rates.

Conclusions:

Demonstrated autonomous, targeted transduction of user-specified DNA messages, decoupling communication channels in engineered biological systems.
Confirmed bacteriophage M13 particle production and message transduction occur in chemotactic bacteria.
Utilized chemotaxis to improve DNA messaging range and communication bit rates compared to small molecule systems.
Postulated that integrating different engineered communication platforms will enable complex spatial programming of cellular consortia.