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Welcome!

This year we established the first iGEM-team at the Heinrich Heine University in Duesseldorf in Germany. Our group consists of 22 undergraduate members, who came together to found the team in late 2015. We all joined iGEM with the motivation to apply and create synthetic biology. Already in the early stage of our project it was definite that we would emphasize on creating a mechanism to fight cancer.

The essentials of OPTOPTOSIS

The global increase of cancer cases and the lack of highly specific therapies for various types of cancer states a clear message: New approaches have to be found, which allow a level of precision in cancer treatment that has been long-awaited. This is the goal of OPTOPTOSIS. Our approach aims at achieving high spatiotemporal control of apoptosis in tumor cells by applying an optogenetic double-killswitch. This system combines clean removal of cancer cells through apoptosis with the precision of light-controlled optogenetics. We utilize two optogenetic proteins, namely Phytochrome B and LOV2. The red light switch based on Phytochrome B controls expression, while the blue light switch LOV2 controls localization of apoptotic proteins to their target site. Read on.

Results

Text. Read on.

Our team

Team

Be sure to check out our marvelous photos on the team page!