The lab harnesses the tools and approaches employed in systems biology to bear on the grand challenges of sustainability. We study carbon fixation, the molecular process supplying our food and fuel while carrying the largest flux in the biosphere. We design and build carbon fixation pathways in E. coli. In the process we gain quantitative insights on metabolism.
We also use large scale data and computational tools to quantify the biosphere and advance a holistic understanding of the global ecology. We believe that biomass is an especially useful metric for this purpose.