Team:Hong Kong HKU/Human Practices
Human Practices
Synthetic biology does not exist solely in the laboratory, as a discipline of Science, it exists in the society with all other subjects.
Throughout the summer, we tried to enhance the interface between society, our project, the iGEM competition and Synthetic Biology as a whole.
Integrated Human Practices
We conducted an interview with Professor Danny Chan upon biosafety in September, 2016.
Professor Chan is the Assistant Dean (Research Postgraduate Studies) of the Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine, the University of Hong Kong.
The interview focused mainly on the biological research laboratory safety, related regulations and research ethics.
He emphasized the importance of educating incoming students on lab safety.
For instance, there is an orientation talk hosted by the safety office for all new postgraduates.
The postgraduates are required to pass a safety test before entering the laboratories.
In addition, he gave his opinion on the impact of current Hong Kong regulations towards scientific research development.
He does not think that the regulations hinder scientific research as the purpose of the regulations is to protect the general public from any laboratory accidents.
This following is a complete recording of our conversation with Professor Danny Chan.
Click Here to view the recording.
Presenter: Shannon Ho
Filming: Hei Wai Lai, Canaan Yung, Aaron Lam
Editor: Janice Law
After the filming of the interview, the representatives had a conversation with Professor Chan on the bacteria used in our project.
He suggested us conduct a risk assessment on the E. Coli strain we were using.
Therefore, here we present the risk assessment of the mentioned strain, relating to our project.
Epilogue by Prof. Chan:
“Well, I hope you love your project. Get HKU a Gold Medal and something special this year”.
And this is what we are striving for.
Outreach and Public Engagement
The Joint School Science Exhibition is a local secondary school based science competition in Hong Kong,
held by the Joint School Science Exhibition Preparation Committee (J.S.S.E.P.C.).
Each of the secondary school teams, or project holders (PH), gets to work on a project based on an annual theme.
This year, project holders gather and present their innovations to the public with the main theme ‘Connection’.
For details, please visit the official website of the JSSE and individual teams.
Our team, The HKU iGEM Team 2016 was delighted to participate in the exhibition as a local University Delegate (UD),
in which we were given opportunities to present our project ideas to the public.
We also had the chance to educate the public about the basics of synthetic biology, which includes fundamental genetics, biomedical concepts and analytical techniques through posters and self-made models.
Below are the photos taken throughout the exhibition period (Aug)
Our team displays posters to enrich public knowledge towards synthetic biology
Our team member Janice was introducing DNA double helix to a little girl. She was fascinated by the DNA double helix paperfold.
Our team member Canaan was explaining the mechanism of DNA strand displacement to a group of secondary school students. The students were interested by the function of molecular beacons and were jotting notes.
The DNA paperfold material and the model to demostrate stand displacement mechanism and its uses in the field.
It was the last day of JSSE and we received positive feedback from the visitors and the organizer of the exhibition. The background is a broad introducing the history of JSSE and we were holding the banner of The University of Hong Kong. From left: Hei Wai Lai, Canaan Yung, Aaron Lam and Kitty Lau.
We distributed introductory booklets to the visitors and DNA double helix folding sheets to the children to enhance our interactivity as well as to expand our target audience.
The booklet is of a bilingual version (in English and Chinese) with contents relating to the iGEM competition, Synthetic Biology with its application, and course, our project.
The online version of the booklet can be found here.
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Back Cover
After the exhibition, we obtained the skill of explaining those sometimes complicated scientific theories to the general public in layman terms. This kind of scientific communication skills is essential for scientists to gain support from the general public and to inspire future generation of scientists through education. We were glad to have this experience while we are still undergraduates.
