Our Sponsors

Without the generous support of our universities, related organizations and many biotech companies our project would not at all have been feasable. We are deeply greatful for the big interest in supporting young stundents in realizing their own projects.

Academic Sponsors

Ludwig Maximilians University Munich

Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München - the University in the heart of Munich. [http://www.en.uni-muenchen.de/ LMU] is recognized as one of Europe's premier academic and research institutions. Since our founding in 1472, LMU has attracted inspired scholars and talented students from all over the world, keeping the University at the nexus of ideas that challenge and change our complex world.

Technical University Munich

[http://tum.de TUM] is one of Europe’s top universities. It is committed to excellence in research and teaching, interdisciplinary education and the active promotion of promising young scientists. The university also forges strong links with companies and scientific institutions across the world. TUM was one of the first universities in Germany to be named a University of Excellence. Moreover, TUM regularly ranks among the best European universities in international rankings.

Chair for Biological Chemistry - Prof. Dr. Skerra

We would like to thank our Principal Investigator [http://biologische-chemie.userweb.mwn.de/ProfSkerra/Skerra.html Professor Dr. Arne Skerra], who generously granted our team not only laboratory space and competitive infrastructure at the [http://biologische-chemie.userweb.mwn.de Chair of Biological Chemistry] but also his scientific supervision and expertise which was of great benefit for us. His internationally acknowledged contributions and comprehensive experience in molecular biotechnology and protein design were repeatedly awarded and his emphasis on practical application and economic use of academic research findings have led to the foundation of two very sucessful biotech companies.

GRK2062 - Molecular Principles of Synthetic Biology

The Research [http://www.grk2062.uni-muenchen.de/ "Molecular Principles of Synthetic Biology" (GRK2062)] is training doctoral researchers in a new way of thinking and in their research approaches. The research projects range from synthetic cells, synthetic switches to synthetic proteins and cell-free synthetic systems. The GRK2062 fosters close interdisciplinary collaborations between junior researchers from biology, chemistry and physics.

We have to thank the members of Steering Committee including our secondary PI Prof. Dr. Jung as well as Dr. Sabine Schneider and Prof. Dr. Schwille for the initiation and their extensive support of our joint university team this year.

DAAD - Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst

The DAAD, Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (German Academic Exchange Service) supports over 100,000 German and international students und researchers around the globe each year – making it the world’s largest funding organisation of its kind. We also promote internationalisation efforts at German universities, help developing countries build their own systems of higher education, and support German Studies and German language programmes abroad.

Wissenschaftszentrum Weihenstephan

The [http://www.wzw.tum.de/ TUM School of Life Sciences Weihenstephan] offers a unique location for science and learning. Its interdisciplinary synergies amongst all fields of the life science represented on the Weihenstephan Campus enable the exploration of the entire life cycle of foodstuffs and raw materials. Researchers at Weihenstephan examine the value chain from genetic and biological building blocks through production and processing to consumption. The close networking of research areas is what distinguishes the TUM School of Life Sciences Weihenstephan.

Lehre at LMU

The LMU-wide program [http://www.uni-muenchen.de/studium/lehre_at_lmu Lehre@LMU for excellence in teaching] aims to promote the development of the quality in teaching and studies. This concepts includes fostering new teaching ideas, expanding mentoring programs and especially supporting young academics.

Bund der Freunde - TUM

The “Bund der Freunde der TUM” (Friends of TUM)supports the Technical University of Munich in science, research and teaching – especially concerning the promotion of young academics. Even small amounts of money can make a difference in research projects, in student activities or help to take part in conferences at home and abroad. As a non-profit organization, this is where the “Bund der Freunde der TUM” (Friends of TUM) comes into play.

LMU Faculty for Biology

TUM Department of Chemistry

CIPSM

The [http://www.cipsm.de/ Center for Integrated Protein Science Munich (CIPSM)] has become the premier facility for protein research in Germany. Set up in 2006, the major goal of the Cluster is to build up a comprehensive picture of protein functions – as isolated molecules, multisubunit complexes and molecular machines that mediate cell processes. So far, work at CiPSM has focused on the molecular properties of specific proteins. In future, more emphasis will be placed on understanding their function in cellular networks and on the chemical manipulation of proteins for therapeutic and diagnostic purposes.

BioM

Since 1997, [http://www.bio-m.org/ BioM] is the networking agency for the biotechnology sector in Munich and Bavaria funded by the Bavarian State Ministry of Economic Affairs (Bayerisches Staatsministerium für Wirtschaft und Medien, Energie und Technologie). They support biotechnology companies and especially start-ups by offering consulting, events and international representation of the location.

Industry Sponsors

IDT - Integrated DNA Technologies

[http://www.idtdna.com IDT] is the largest manufacturer of custom oligo products in the US today. They are also very good at bigger pieces of DNA. Without their generous support nearly none of our constructs would have been possible. Thankfully 10 kB are quite a lot, though we had to use it to the last base.

Geneious

[http://www.geneious.com/ Geneious] is one of the world’s leading bioinformatics software platforms. A powerful and easy-to-use tool for planning and archiving your DNA library. This program made constructing our parts really easy and with an awesome sever function to share our library for every team member and access it from wherever we were. It saved us from loosing the overview of our parts. Quite an genius software.

NEB - New England Biolabs

Our trusted provider of high quality enzymes [Link NEB] is

Carl Roth

Founded in 1879 Carl Roth has been providing the laboratories and research facilities with high grade lab equipment and and chemicals for a over 135 years. Our trusted equipment was used in literally every transformation and our stylish pink tube racks even functioned as decor. Furthermore they provided us with lots of great storage boxes for all those 800+ DNA tubes we created during our project.

Eurofins

[http://www.eurofins.de/ Eurofins] is a worldwide leader in its field. The Group offers a portfolio of more than 150,000 reliable and validated analytical methods for evaluating the safety, identity, composition, authenticity, origin, traceability and purity of biological substances and products. But most importantly for us was their great over-night sequencing service. They allowed us to check all our constructs for success and avoid the problems of unwanted SNPs. In addition to that they also produce great primes for all the PCRs we had to make.

SERVA

True to their Motto: "SERVA serving scientists", [http://www.serva.de/ SERVA] is producing high quality products for a variety of lab applications though their specialty are electrophoresis gels and buffer of all kinds. They allowed us to precisely analyse and characterise the whole suite of proteins we produced over the course of the summer. And we have to thank them especially for our lab mascot and lucky charm, Servatius the squirrel.

Zymo Research

[http://www.zymoresearch.com/ Zymo Research] is a company that once was founded in a garage and has now become the provider of high quality and simple to use nucleic acid purification technologies. They helped us out with their grown-up Plasmid Maxiprep Kit. And the best part of this product is arguably the beautiful array of different colors. Its pretty much impossible to mix those solutions up.

QIAGEN

Our sponsor QIAGEN is a world wide active provider of sample and assay technologies for all kinds of research insitutions. We used their awesome DNA preparation kits almost every day. We could not have assembled all of our Biobricks without them. No wonder that half the teams knows the instructions from memory ;)

Bio-Rad

Since [http://www.bio-rad.com/ Bio-Rad] was founded over six decades ago, they have developed into a global supplier for the healthcare industry with innovative and useful products that help life science researchers accelerate the discovery process and medical diagnostic labs obtain faster, better results. And our stylish rack has a powerful attraction, magnetic attraction.

Faust

Offering all you may want for you lab, from standard reaction tubes to complex devices, [http://www.faustlabscience.de/ Faust Lab Science] is a great supplier of everyday lab equipment. We especially liked the yellow color of our tubes and racks.

Eppendorf

The high quality products of Eppendorf can be found all over the globe in every kind of scientific laboratory. They supplied us with our trusted favorite pipette that we use whenever we can. It is a real pleasure to work with it, even when you have to perform dozens of ligations.

Promega

Promega is a global leader in providing innovative solutions and technical support to life scientists in academic, industrial and government settings. Their portfolio of more than 3,000 products covers the fields of genomics, protein analysis and expression, cellular analysis, drug discovery and genetic identity. With their great and easy to use kits we were not only able to clean grams of DNA but also to fully analyse the viability of our transfected cells.

ibidi

We are happy to also be able to count the Munich company [http://ibidi.com/ ibidi] to our sposors. They are spin-off of both of our universities and are now a leading provider for innovative functional cell-based assay technologies utilized in academic research, applied testing, biotechnology and pharma. Their slides are made for our bioprinter.

Satorius

Sartorius is a leading international pharmaceutical and laboratory equipment supplier. With our innovative products and services, we are helping our customers across the entire globe to implement their complex and quality-critical biomanufacturing and laboratory processes reliably and economically. Their support software for our fermentor was very helpful for the up-scaled production of our beloved proteins.

Abcam

[http://www.abcam.com/ Abcam] is a true specialist for antibodies and everything you can do with them. Their growing range of products includes primary and secondary antibodies, biochemicals, proteins, peptides, lysates, immunoassays and other kits helps precisely detect whatever you need.

Red Bull

There is no doubt that "[http://www.redbull.com/ Red Bull] gives you wings" when you have to stay in the lab 'til late in the evening to finish your experiments. This pile of liquid energy was a refreshingly different accelerator of our work.

References