ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses questions of the natural designs of biological systems, and also addresses how one can alter the existing design of a biological system in a goal-oriented fashion or even create new biological systems. The targeted alteration of existing biological systems or the de novo creation of novel systems offers the potential of using biology for new purposes. Optimization is center-stage in the design of synthetic biological systems. An important aspect of biological systems is that they employ similar components time and again in a modular and hierarchical manner. Between the discovery and analysis of natural design principles on the one hand and the creation of novel biological systems from component parts (that is, synthetic biology) on the other lies a large field of activities that attempt to manipulate, and subsequently optimize, existing systems toward a desired goal. Understanding and altering the design of biological systems is in some sense the ultimate goal of systems, synthetic, and applied biology.
