Statement of Purpose, Jerome Ku, Biomedical Engineering MS w/ ThesisI want to make a difference in the world, and I want to do this by creating biomedical devices and technologies. I have put my heart into many different pursuits during my undergraduate years - some academic, some not - and it is through this amalgam of experiences that I have come to realize my lifes ambition. Research has made me appreciate the rigors of the scientific process and at the same time, the excitement of laying the groundwork for technology that could one-day change the way we live; founding a volunteer organization has revealed to me my passion for fostering a better world; working at a start-up and leading the Entrepreneurship Club has acquainted me with entrepreneurs young and old whose moxie and passion has been truly inspiring; and oddly enough, a summer on Wall St. made me realize that science is my true passion. Through these experiences, Ive learned what kind of person I am and what kind of life I want to lead: I know now that I value my passion for knowledge and desire to make a difference through science, medicine, and technology, above all else. I know that I want to dedicate my life to biomedical invention, innovation, and somewhere down the road, entrepreneurship. During the summer between my freshman and sophomore years, I worked in Professor Ron Weiss lab, applying electrical engineering principles to cellular systems in the emerging field of synthetic biology. I “programmed” cellular behavior by engineering and inserting simple synthetic networks of genetic regulatory elements“logic gates”into the model organism E. Coli, a step towards the goal of someday being able to “program” cells and cellular systems as easily as we program computers today. I continued this research during my junior and senior years, engaging in a year and half-long independent project to engineer the Rhl quorum-sensing genetic circuit found in the pathogen Pseudomonas Aeruginosa. Quorum-sensing systems are well-documented and are used by bacteria for communication and population-based control of genes. One of the goals of this research is to be able to control and coordinate cellular and population behavior through synthetic genetic circuitry, and quorum-sensing systems are a natural jumping off point for building a library of communication and control components. The purpose of my project, specifically, was to generate, using directed evolution, a library of circuits with a range of specificities and sensitivities that could be matched with other quorum-sensing circuits for purposes of intercellular communication. Based on the results of my work, we were able to implement one such intercellular communication network whereby gene expression is only activated upon co-localization and exchange of signals between mixed populations, a system that can conceivably be used to target cancer. These results are currently being developed into a scientific paper.Towards the end of my senior year and continuing into the summer of 2005, I switched my research focus to stem cells. Here, I worked with one of Professor Weiss graduate students in constructing synthetic gene networks for orchestrating genetic expression and differentiation at a single cell and multi-population level. The long-range implications of such research is truly awe-inspiring, as we will some day be able to program the formation of tissues at a cellular level. To achieve this long-term goal, we started by constructing basic building block systems: using the tet-On, tetR/O, and lacR/O regulatory systems and developmental master switches (MyoD, Ppar-gamma, Nanog), we designed and built a 1:2 multiplexer and toggle switch, and also synthesized a novel signal transduction system by employing send/receive components from Arabidopsis thaliana and S. cerevisiae (this cross species signal relay system will minimize effects of crosstalk). Much time was spent on circuit construction in E. Coli and preliminary verification of circuit function by transient transfection of 293 cells (commonly used mammalian cell line). Most of the constructs were nearing completion towards the end of my stint, and we had begun large-scale production of lentivirus vectors in preparation for transduction of various ES cell lines. This work should result in several publications. Although most of my research has been in the area of synthetic biology, I am also very interested in the biological applications of microfabrication and aim to explore the area of bioMEMS/nanotechnology/molecular diagnostics in graduate school. My undergraduate concentration within electrical engineering was solid state devices, and I have also been doing background reading (Fundamentals of Microfabrication, by Madou) as well as utilizing course websites for notes and references to scientific literature in this area. In addition to this self-study, I am scheduled to take part in a bioMEMS research projec