Ingmar Riedel-Kruse

Classification: Joint Faculty

Education: Ph.D., 2005, TU Dresden, Germany

Fields of Study: 

• Biophysics
• Synthetic Biology
• Microbiology
• Bioengineering

Research Interests: 

Multicellularity enables organisms and symbiotic systems to achieve complex tasks through division of labor among cells. Such systems transcend current man-made materials and electronics in many ways, e.g., they synthesize chemicals, generate active physical forms, and self-replicate. The ability to harness these features promises significant impact for research (build-to-understand methodology), manufacturing (smart materials), health (tissue engineering), chemistry (pathway modularization), ecology (bioremediation), biodesign (art), and more. Multicellularity is the next frontier of synthetic biology!

Our current research focuses on engineering multicellular bacterial systems while controlling their morphology, patterning, dynamics, and environmental responses. We combine biophysics, synthetic biology, mathematics, and interaction design. We recently engineered the first synthetic, fully genetically encoded cell-cell adhesion toolbox (Glass Cell 2018) and the first optogenetic high-resolution cell-surface patterning method (‘Biofilm Lithography’) (Jin PNAS 2018) – providing key missing tools for engineering synthetic multicell systems (Kim Nature 2022). We also pioneered the field of Interactive Bio-Technology (IBT) that enables humans to directly interact with and program living multicell assemblies in real-time (Lee Frontiers in Computer Science 2022).

Selected Publications:

Converting Methane into Electricity and Value Chemicals at Scale via Anaerobic Microbial Fuel Cells
Wood T*, Gurgan I, Howley ET, Riedel-Kruse IH*
Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews (2023) 188 113749.

4-bit adhesion logic enables universal multicellular interface patterning
Kim H, Skinner DJ, Glass DS, Hamby AE, Stuart BAR, Dunkel J, Riedel-Kruse IH*
Nature  (2022) 608, 324–329.

Nonlinear delay differential equations and their application to modeling biological networks
Glass D, Jin X, Riedel-Kruse IH*
Nature Communications (2021) 12, 1788.

Polygonal motion and adaptable phototaxis via flagellar beat switching in the microswimmer Euglena gracilis
Tsang A, Lam A, Riedel-Kruse IH*
Nature Physics 14, 1216-1222 (2018).

First-hand, immersive full-body experiences with living cells through interactive museum exhibits
Lam AT, Ma J, Barr C, Lee SA, White A, Yu K, Riedel-Kruse IH*
Nature Biotechnology (2019) 37, 1238.