Biomolecular control group
Systems & Synthetic Biology at the University of Edinburgh




what we do
Our team develops computational methods to study molecular processes in living cells. We use mathematics to understand natural networks and to design novel systems for biotechnology and biomedicine. We employ a wide range of methods, such as machine learning, control theory, stochastic analysis and network theory. Large parts of our work are in collaboration with Systems and Synthetic Biology labs in the UK and abroad.
who we are
The group lead is Diego Oyarzún and includes research students and postdocs. Together we gather expertise in many disciplines like machine learning, mathematics, biochemistry and bioinformatics.
where we work
We are very lucky to be located at the School of Informatics and the School of Biological Sciences of the University of Edinburgh, in one of the most vibrant European capitals. We are members of the Edinburgh Centre for Engineering Biology.
our recent science
- Discovery of drug candidates against brain cancer
- Using mechanistic knowledge in sequence-to-expression models
- Protein deimmunization with direct preference optimization
- Risk-averse design of synthetic gene circuits
- Single-cell metabolic oscillations in yeast
- Integration of kinetic and genome-scale metabolic models
- Graph neural networks for predicting gene essentiality
news
Mar 25, 2025 | Vanessa’s paper on new drug candidates against brain cancer is out in preprint, great collaboration with Neil Carragher’s team! |
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Mar 15, 2025 | Many congratulations to Zuzanna for submitting her PhD thesis! |
Feb 10, 2025 | Yuxin’s paper on generalization of sequence-to-expression models is out in Nucleic Acids Research, congrats! |
Dec 1, 2024 | Arin’s paper on single-cell metabolic oscillations is out in preprint - this is part of a great collaboration with the Swain lab. |
Nov 25, 2024 | Michal’s paper on risk-averse design of synthetic gene circuits is out in preprint - super nice collaboration with Michael Gutmann. |
Nov 5, 2024 | We have an exciting PhD position on AI for drug discovery against Chagas disease. |
Oct 10, 2024 | A very warm farewell to Ricardo, who has taken up a postdoctoral role at the Earlham Institute after a brilliant PhD! |
Oct 1, 2024 | We welcome five new members to our team: Nicola, Alperen, Cata, Pattie and Sam. A pleasure to have you with us! |
Sep 30, 2024 | Super congrats to Charlotte for winning the Best Talk Award at FOSBE 2024 in Corfu, Greece. |
Sep 15, 2024 | Very exciting to see that several team members have a busy schedule speaking at various conferences in the UK and abroad, including SynBio UK in Cambridge and Next-Generation Synthetic Biology in Belgium. |