Help:Parts

Revision as of 21:00, 5 February 2012 by Vinoo (Talk | contribs)

What are standard biological parts

Example needed (besides Lego) - Hardware store? Electronic components? Picture needed!

Technically speaking, a standard biological part (or simply, part) is a sequence of DNA that encodes for a biological function. Just in the same way if you went to an electronics store to pick up a transistor, capacitor, or motor to build an electronic machine, you would come to the Registry to get a promoter, ribosome binding site, or coding region to build a biological machine. or A basic part is a single functional unit that cannot be divided further into smaller functional units, but basic parts can be assembled together to make longer, more complex composite parts. Ultimately, parts can be assembled together to create biological systems in cells.

The Registry organizes its parts by type/function. You can find more information about part types on the part catalog.

Why do part types matter?

Why use Registry parts?

Coupled with their functional organization, parts can be easily assembled together. You can take a promoter, add a ribosome binding site, then a protein coding region, and finally a terminator.


Why are parts easily assembled?

is flanked on both ends with standard sequences, referred to as a prefix and suffix. The prefix and suffix contain restriction sites, which when used with a restriction enzyme (cutting) and DNA ligase (connecting), allows parts to be assembled together forming a new part.

The specific sequences of the prefix and suffix of a part are defined by their <a href="https://parts.igem.org/Help:Standards">standard</a>. All parts belonging to a standard will have the same prefix and suffix. This means that anyone can join two parts within a standard. The BioBrick (RFC10) standard is the


Different standards

The Registry supports several standards, and among them the BioBrick standard is currently the most used. To accommodate the needs of building different systems with different methods, there


How do I...

get parts

use parts

make parts

send parts