Team:Macquarie Australia/France

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Collaboration with Paris Bettencourt iGem Team 2016

This year’s Macquarie University iGem team continued a tradition of collaboration by assisting the Paris Bettencourt iGem Team with their project. The Paris team’s project this year involves determining the enzymes involved in the break- down of pigment molecules in wine. The idea for this project stems from the fact that wine stains on clothes are amongst the hardest stains to remove, requiring, amongst others, perchloroethylene, which is listed as a possible human carcinogen. As such, finding an alternative method to removing wine stains would be beneficial to human health. The need for collecting samples from vineyards stems from the idea that certain organisms contain enzymes that are able to degrade wine pigments such as anthocyanins and tannins. Collecting these samples would enable the isolation and identification of these enzymes.

The many quality wine producing regions of Australia made collaborating with the Paris team for their iGem project seem a natural fit for collecting the required samples. After discussing with the Paris team about their requirements, we were able to collect two samples from a vineyard here in Australia for their project. The first sample was a falcen tube of soil obtained from an located around the roots of a vine. The second sample contained contain vine bark, as well as shoots from both last year’s vintage, and this year’s vintage. A more detailed description of the samples obtained is as follows:

Sample 1
The soil sample comes from what is originally clay soil. 16 years ago, the soil was improved with large amounts of cow manure, and other nutrients. No such improvements have occurred since then, although there is the occasional top up with chicken manure only. The soil was obtained from the base of the trunk, just under the top soil, near vine roots.

Sample 2
There are three components to sample 2. There is bark off the trunk of the vina, a shoot from last seasons vintage, and a new shoot for this seasons vintage.

Given samples were being sent overseas. Customs forms for both France and Australia needed to be completed detailing what was contained in the samples. Examples of the customs forms that needed to be completed are attached. Customs Declaration French Collaboration