ArticleNucleic acids research2015
Multilayered genetic safeguards limit growth of microorganisms to defined environments.
Article in Nucleic acids research, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 74 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
74 citing papers in PubMed.
- Gene Exchange Mechanisms in Natural and Engineered Probiotics Within the Human Gut Implications for Antibiotic Resistance and Metabolic Modulation.Probiotics and antimicrobial proteins · 2026Review
- A Metagenome-Based Methodology to Track Genomically Recoded Strains and Assess Their Effects on Indigenous Microbes.Environmental science & technology · 2026Article
- Engineering commensal microbes for host health.Cell host & microbe · 2026Review
- Multiplexing antibiotic screening assay in droplet microfluidics.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Advances in biocontainment strategies of engineered microbes for use in humans.Current opinion in microbiology · 2026Review
- Multiplexed CRISPR base editing enables pulse-activated irreversible biocontainment of engineered bacteria.Nucleic acids research · 2026Article
- mGem: Applying microbiome therapeutic learnings to next-generation agricultural bioproducts.mBio · 2026Review
- Protecting cells at the genetic level and simulating unauthorized access via a biohackathon.Science advances · 2026Article
- Reduction of Hexavalent Chromium by Stenotrophomonas and Bacillus.MicrobiologyOpen · 2026Review
- Programming Next-Generation Synthetic Biosensors by Genetic Circuit Design.Advanced science (Weinheim, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany) · 2026Review
- Synthetic Biology of Plants and Microbes for Agriculture, Environment, and Future Applications.Chemical reviews · 2026Review
- A modular toolkit for theophylline-dependent synthetic auxotrophs via riboswitch-gated essential genes.PloS one · 2026Article
- Genetic Entanglement Enables Ultrastable Biocontainment in the Mammalian Gut.ACS synthetic biology · 2025Article
- A genetic safeguard for eliminating target genes in synthetic probiotics in a gut environment.iScience · 2025Article
- Genetic "expiry-date" circuits control lifespan of synthetic scavenger bacteria for safe bioremediation.Nucleic acids research · 2025Article
- Recent Advances in Heterologous Protein Expression and Natural Product Synthesis byJournal of fungi (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Review
- A roadmap to understanding and anticipating microbial gene transfer in soil communities.Microbiology and molecular biology reviews : MMBR · 2025Review
- Be a GEM: Biocontained, environmentally applied, genetically engineered microbes.Advanced drug delivery reviews · 2025Review
- Environment signal dependent biocontainment systems for engineered organisms: Leveraging triggered responses and combinatorial systems.Synthetic and systems biotechnology · 2025Review
- Engineering biology applications for environmental solutions: potential and challenges.Nature communications · 2025Review
14 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are commonly used to produce valuable compounds in closed industrial systems. However, their emerging applications in open clinical or environmental settings require enhanced safety and security measures. Intrinsic biocontainment, the creation of bacterial hosts unable to survive in natural environments, remains a major unsolved biosafety problem. We developed a new biocontainment strategy containing overlapping 'safeguards'-engineered riboregulators that tightly control expression of essential genes, and an engineered addiction module based on nucleases that cleaves the host genome-to restrict viability of Escherichia coli cells to media containing exogenously supplied synthetic small molecules. These multilayered safeguards maintain robust growth in permissive conditions, eliminate persistence and limit escape frequencies to <1.3 × 10(-12). The staged approach to safeguard implementation revealed mechanisms of escape and enabled strategies to overcome them. Our safeguarding strategy is modular and employs conserved mechanisms that could be extended to clinically or industrially relevant organisms and undomesticated species.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.