Independence among synthetic genetic devices in the bacterium Escherichia coli extends to the time-domain

Engineering biology in a direct, systematic manner is limited today. The ability to build biological systems from components that act independent of one another has the potential to make the forward engineering of biology practical. Previously, we have shown that independence among synthetic genetic devices is possible in Escherichia coli under steady-state conditions. Here, we show that independence is also possible under transient conditions, suggesting that the ability of biological systems to exhibit linear behavior is not contextually-dependent. Furthermore, the green fluorescent protein part was once again observed to be the most nonlinear in the model system. This suggests it may not be well suited for characterization purposes irrespective of the context.