Kristala L. Jones Prather
· Arthur Dehon Little Professor; Professor of Chemical EngineeringMassachusetts Institute of Technology · Chemical Engineering
Active 2002–2024
About
Kristala L. Jones Prather is the Arthur Dehon Little Professor and a Professor of Chemical Engineering at MIT. She is the head of the Department of Chemical Engineering. Her research focuses on chemical engineering, with particular emphasis on biomedical and biotechnology, catalysis and reaction engineering, energy, environment and sustainability, materials, math and computational systems, and transport and thermodynamics. As a faculty member, she contributes to advancing knowledge in these areas and plays a leadership role within the department.
Research topics
- Computer Science
- Biotechnology
- Biology
- Computational biology
- Chemistry
- Engineering
- Biochemistry
- Biochemical engineering
- Cell biology
- Neuroscience
- Immunology
- Bioinformatics
- Control engineering
Selected publications
Annual Review of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering · 2021 · 68 citations
Senior authorCorresponding- Computer Science
- Biology
- Computational biology
Metabolic engineering reprograms cells to synthesize value-added products. In doing so, endogenous genes are altered and heterologous genes can be introduced to achieve the necessary enzymatic reactions. Dynamic regulation of metabolic flux is a powerful control scheme to alleviate and overcome the competing cellular objectives that arise from the introduction of these production pathways. This review explores dynamic regulation strategies that have demonstrated significant production benefits by targeting the metabolic node corresponding to a specific challenge. We summarize the stimulus-responsive control circuits employed in these strategies that determine the criterion for actuating a dynamic response and then examine the points of control that couple the stimulus-responsive circuit to a shift in metabolic flux.
Effective use of biosensors for high-throughput library screening for metabolite production
Journal of Industrial Microbiology & Biotechnology · 2021 · 64 citations
Senior authorCorresponding- Computer Science
- Biochemical engineering
- Computer Science
The development of fast and affordable microbial production from recombinant pathways is a challenging endeavor, with targeted improvements difficult to predict due to the complex nature of living systems. To address the limitations in biosynthetic pathways, much work has been done to generate large libraries of various genetic parts (promoters, RBSs, enzymes, etc.) to discover library members that bring about significantly improved levels of metabolite production. To evaluate these large libraries, high throughput approaches are necessary, such as those that rely on biosensors. There are various modes of operation to apply biosensors to library screens that are available at different scales of throughput. The effectiveness of each biosensor-based method is dependent on the pathway or strain to which it is applied, and all approaches have strengths and weaknesses to be carefully considered for any high throughput library screen. In this review, we discuss the various approaches used in biosensor screening for improved metabolite production, focusing on transcription factor-based biosensors.
The importance and future of biochemical engineering
Biotechnology and Bioengineering · 2020 · 16 citations
- Biochemical engineering
- Chemistry
- Computational biology
Today's Biochemical Engineer may contribute to advances in a wide range of technical areas. The recent Biochemical and Molecular Engineering XXI conference focused on "The Next Generation of Biochemical and Molecular Engineering: The role of emerging technologies in tomorrow's products and processes". On the basis of topical discussions at this conference, this perspective synthesizes one vision on where investment in research areas is needed for biotechnology to continue contributing to some of the world's grand challenges.
ACS Synthetic Biology · 2020 · 96 citations
Senior authorCorresponding- Biology
- Computational biology
- Cell biology
As synthetic biology and metabolic engineering tools improve, it is feasible to construct more complex microbial synthesis systems that may be limited by the machinery and resources available in an individual cell. Coculture fermentation is a promising strategy for overcoming these constraints by distributing objectives between subpopulations, but the primary method for controlling the composition of the coculture of production systems has been limited to control of the inoculum composition. We have developed a quorum sensing (QS)-based growth-regulation circuit that provides an additional parameter for regulating the composition of a coculture over the course of the fermentation. Implementation of this tool in a naringenin-producing coculture resulted in a 60% titer increase over a system that was optimized by varying inoculation ratios only. We additionally demonstrated that the growth control circuit can be implemented in combination with a communication module that couples transcription in one subpopulation to the cell-density of the other population for coordination of behavior, resulting in an additional 60% improvement in naringenin titer.
Recent grants
Development and Analysis of Autonomous Metabolite Valves
NSF · $370k · 2015–2019
CAREER: Design, Construction and Characterization of Metabolite Valves
NSF · $400k · 2010–2016
Multiplexing Autonomous Metabolite Valves
NSF · $481k · 2018–2022
Frequent coauthors
- 34 shared
D.M.F. Prazeres
- 33 shared
L. R. Rodrigues
Serviço Nacional de Aprendizagem Comercial
- 31 shared
Gabriel A. Monteiro
Instituto Superior Técnico
- 27 shared
Joana L. Rodrigues
University of Minho
- 21 shared
Geisa A. L. Gonçalves
Kyushu University
- 18 shared
Eric Shiue
Technische Universität Braunschweig
- 18 shared
Soyoung Lee
- 16 shared
Collin H. Martin
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Labs
Education
- 2000
Ph.D., Chemical Engineering
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- 1996
M.S., Chemical Engineering
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- 1994
B.S., Chemical Engineering
University of California, Berkeley
Awards & honors
- Elected, Member of the National Academy of Engineering, 2025
- MIT, Committed to Caring (C2C) Award, 2023-25
- AIChE's Andreas Acrivos Award for Professional Progress in C…
- Gordon Y. Billard Award, 2021
- Fellow of the AAAS, 2018
Similar researchers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- Resume-aware match score
- Save to shortlist
- AI-drafted outreach
See your match with Kristala L. Jones Prather
PhdFit ranks faculty by your research interests, methods, and publications — grounded in their actual work, not templates.
- Free to start
- No credit card
- 30-second signup