Difference between revisions of "Team:Newcastle"

 
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             <h2>Our Motivation</h2>
 
             <h2>Our Motivation</h2>
             <p class="pale">Electronic engineering has given us the television and the mobile phone, while genetic engineering has afforded us mass-scale antimalarial drugs, biofuels and a plethora of biosensors. </p>
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             <p class="pale">Electronic engineering has given us the television and the mobile phone, while genetic engineering has afforded us mass-scale antimalarial drugs, biofuels and a plethora of biosensors.</p>
  
             <p class="pale">More than a decade ago, Tom Knight and colleagues at MIT envisioned using 'BioBricks' to standardise synthetic biological parts. Here at Newcastle, we want to return to iGEM's humble origins and come full circle. We are currently working on replacing traditional electronic components with biological alternatives. Through the creation of new compatible bacterial components, we aim to unite biological and electrical components to create electro-biological circuitry within a breadboard chassis.</p>
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             <p class="pale">If one thinks back to the humble beginnings of synthetic biology only 50 years ago, scientists could only speculate at the phenomenon that this field would have on the scientific community. Here at Newcastle University, we have attempted to create a novel field of synthetic biology by fusing biology with electronics. Our project involved looking at electronic circuitry and combining biology and electronics to create alternative parts resulting in an electro-biological system. We used the HtpG heat shock promoter to make a biological, heat-induced light bulb, modifying the pores of <i>E. coli</i> to generate a higher electrical output from a microbial fuel cell, along with a biological capacitor and light-dependent resistors. We believe the concepts for this new field are endless and “electrifying”. Just as the Polish geneticist Waclaw Szybalski said for synthetic biology, we too believe that we will “not run out of exciting and novel ideas” within the field of bioelectronics.</p>
  
           <p class="pale">The circuit will allow synthetic biologists to combine bacterial and electronic components to create electro-biological circuits, offering an exciting new fusion of synthetic biology, electronic engineering, and computer science. The ultimate goal of the Culture Shock project is to achieve consistent outputs for our biological parts.</p>
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           <p class="pale">The aim of the Culture Shock project is to allow synthetic biologists to combine bacterial and electronic components to create electro-biological circuits, offering an exciting new fusion of synthetic biology, electronic engineering, and computer science.</p>
 
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             <h2>Our Achievements</h2>
 
             <h2>Our Achievements</h2>
<p class="brown homep">As a team, we have achieved a lot over the course of our relatively short (but <a href="https://twitter.com/ncliGEM16">great!</a>) summer as part of iGEM. We have <a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Newcastle/Parts">designed</a>, characterised, and documented new parts in the <a href="http://parts.igem.org/cgi/partsdb/pgroup.cgi?pgroup=iGEM2016&amp;group=Newcastle">iGEM Registry of Standard Biological Parts</a>. Not content with just working on our our project, we have also made lots of new friends through <a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Newcastle/Collaborations">collaboration with a number of teams</a> and our attendance in UK and European meets.</p>
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<p class="brown homep">As a team, we have achieved a lot as a part of iGEM. For our project we set out to create biological versions of the electronic components that are used in many electronic circuits, such as lightbulbs and batteries. We have <a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Newcastle/Parts">designed</a>, characterised, and documented new parts in the <a href="http://parts.igem.org/cgi/partsdb/pgroup.cgi?pgroup=iGEM2016&amp;group=Newcastle">parts registry</a>. We have also made lots of new friends through <a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Newcastle/Collaborations">collaboration with a number of teams</a> and our attendance in UK and European meetups. Finally, we prototyped an electronic breadboard kit that will allow a user to combine electronic parts with these new biological versions.</p>
 
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<p class="brown homep">As well as getting to know fellow iGEM-ers, we have run school taster days to get 16 & 17-year-olds interested in synthetic biology. We also met with researchers in the field to <a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Newcastle/Human_Practices">explore the ethical impact of our work</a>. Acting upon these meetings, we have written software to explore different aspects of our project, addressing topics such as <a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Newcastle/Notebook/Lab/ODE-Modelling">'how it would biological parts integrate into an electric circuit'</a>, and <a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Newcastle/Human_Practices">'how to use thought experiment to explore the ethics of our work'</a>. If you thought we’d just stick to software you’d be wrong, for our project we also built a prototype 'plug n play' breadboard kit to articulate how we imagine biological and electronic components uniting in the real world.</p>
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<p class="brown homep">And that’s not all, over the summer we have also submitted <a href="http://parts.igem.org/Part:BBa_K1895003">corrections to sequences in the registry</a> and built on the work of past iGEM teams like <a href="https://2011.igem.org/Team:Tokyo-NoKoGen/metallothionein">Tokyo-NoKoGen 2011</a>'s use of metallothioneins, and <a href="https://2013.igem.org/Team:Bielefeld-Germany/Project/MFC"> 2013 Bielefeld</a>'s use of porins in microbial fuel cells. Last but not least, we participated in the <a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Newcastle/InterLab">2016 InterLab study</a>, completing both the plate reader and flow cytometry data collection tasks.<p>
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<p class="brown homep">Over the summer we have also submitted <a href="http://parts.igem.org/Part:BBa_K1895003">corrections to sequences in the registry</a> and built on the work of past iGEM teams like <a href="https://2011.igem.org/Team:Tokyo-NoKoGen/metallothionein">Tokyo-NoKoGen 2011</a>'s use of metallothioneins, and <a href="https://2013.igem.org/Team:Bielefeld-Germany/Project/MFC"> 2013 Bielefeld</a>'s use of porins in microbial fuel cells. Last but not least, we participated in the <a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Newcastle/InterLab">2016 InterLab study</a>, completing both the plate reader and flow cytometry data collection tasks.<p>
  
 
<p class="brown homep">You can find much more information, on our achievements and how they relate to the iGEM medal requirements on <a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Newcastle/Medals">our medal requirements page</a>.</p>
 
<p class="brown homep">You can find much more information, on our achievements and how they relate to the iGEM medal requirements on <a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Newcastle/Medals">our medal requirements page</a>.</p>

Latest revision as of 02:18, 20 October 2016

Newcastle iGEM 2016

Scroll down to learn more about our Culture Shock project

Our Motivation

Electronic engineering has given us the television and the mobile phone, while genetic engineering has afforded us mass-scale antimalarial drugs, biofuels and a plethora of biosensors.

If one thinks back to the humble beginnings of synthetic biology only 50 years ago, scientists could only speculate at the phenomenon that this field would have on the scientific community. Here at Newcastle University, we have attempted to create a novel field of synthetic biology by fusing biology with electronics. Our project involved looking at electronic circuitry and combining biology and electronics to create alternative parts resulting in an electro-biological system. We used the HtpG heat shock promoter to make a biological, heat-induced light bulb, modifying the pores of E. coli to generate a higher electrical output from a microbial fuel cell, along with a biological capacitor and light-dependent resistors. We believe the concepts for this new field are endless and “electrifying”. Just as the Polish geneticist Waclaw Szybalski said for synthetic biology, we too believe that we will “not run out of exciting and novel ideas” within the field of bioelectronics.

The aim of the Culture Shock project is to allow synthetic biologists to combine bacterial and electronic components to create electro-biological circuits, offering an exciting new fusion of synthetic biology, electronic engineering, and computer science.

Our Achievements

As a team, we have achieved a lot as a part of iGEM. For our project we set out to create biological versions of the electronic components that are used in many electronic circuits, such as lightbulbs and batteries. We have designed, characterised, and documented new parts in the parts registry. We have also made lots of new friends through collaboration with a number of teams and our attendance in UK and European meetups. Finally, we prototyped an electronic breadboard kit that will allow a user to combine electronic parts with these new biological versions.

Over the summer we have also submitted corrections to sequences in the registry and built on the work of past iGEM teams like Tokyo-NoKoGen 2011's use of metallothioneins, and 2013 Bielefeld's use of porins in microbial fuel cells. Last but not least, we participated in the 2016 InterLab study, completing both the plate reader and flow cytometry data collection tasks.

You can find much more information, on our achievements and how they relate to the iGEM medal requirements on our medal requirements page.

What Next?

The foundation advance provided by the Culture Shock project opens up a myriad of potential research routes for the emerging field of Bioelectronics. Applications such as self-healing circuitry and "living" electronic and cell integrated computers no longer seem as implausible and distant as they once did.

With any new technology it is important to consider the surrounding ethical issues, as well as general Public response. We felt obligated to spend a considerable amount of time considering potential ethical issues associated with these ideas. Our "Thought Experiment" was the culmination of this, and considers four of these key concepts, with each having its own level. You can play through the entire thought experiment here, or read up on our entire human practices work here.

Sponsors

  • Newcastle Centre for Synthetic Biology and the Bioeconomy
  • ICO2S Research Group
  • Newcastle University
  • Centre for Bacterial Cell Biology
  • Wellcome Trust
  • BBSRC
  • Society for Experimental Biology
  • PEALS
  • IDT
  • Proto-Pic
  • Sigma-Aldrich
  • Goodfellows
  • BMG Labtech