Synthetic biologists at Northwestern and Stanford engineered an artificial metabolic pathway that converts waste CO₂ into useful biological precursors. The lead finding: the team designed a non‑natural metabolic network that captures CO₂ and channels it into compounds used as feedstocks for biochemical synthesis. The work uses enzyme engineering and pathway assembly to create a functional metabolism not found in nature. This approach could enable sustainable production of chemicals and materials from atmospheric carbon, and it demonstrates how pathway design can repurpose central carbon flux for industrial biotechnology.