AIBN Seminar Series Understanding of the overlapping between Biochemical Engineering and Synthetic Biology

Abstract

My research focuses on combining the areas of Biochemical Engineering and Synthetic Biology. In my reserach group, we apply synthetic biology tools to engineer microbial cell factories to produce high-value products like biofuels, biomaterials and pharmaceuticals.We also develop novel continuous-flow bioreactors to host the engineered cells, as well as engineering the microbial cell factories to be suitable for continuous flow bioprocesses.

My reserach focuses on promoting further understanding of the overlapping areas of Biochemical Engineering and Synthetic Biology, resulting in novel ways to apply this knowledge to tackle the global growing socio-economic inequalities. They follow the idea that if scientists work together and gear their research and related activities towards this end, an immense contribution will be made fighting problems like equal access to food, energy and pharmaceuticals, boosting local bio-economies, access to high-quality education as well as the promotion of a sustainable environment.

Presenter:

Associate Professor Leonardo Rios Solis
University of Newcastle, School of Natural and Environmental Sciences, Molecular Biology and Biotechnology. United Kingdom

Bio

Associate Professor Leonardo Rios is an Honorary Lecturer at the University of Edinburgh, in 2022 he was recruited as Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) by the University of Newcastle, School of Natural and Environmental Sciences, Molecular Biology and Biotechnology.

Leonardo Rios earned his Chemical Engineering MEng and Biotechnology MSc degree at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) and the Mexican Institute of Petroleum. During his PhD, he worked under the supervision of Professor Gary J. Lye where he worked in microscale automated tools to design, model and optimise de novo pathways. Leonardo then won a prestigious postdoctoral fellowship from the University of California Berkeley to perform research study at the Keasling Lab in the Joint BioEnergy Institute in the microbial synthetic biology field.

Leonardo is also very interested in developing new cheaper bioprocesses for biologics production, and he is co-founded the startup Artes Genomicas SA de CV, which is looking to enable wider access of expensive biologics to the underprivileged sector while promoting local production. Leonardo is also the co-founder of Marizca LTD and Logikopt SA de CV.