Team:TJUSLS China/HP/Gold
Gold
Overview
To expand the thought of our project, we go talk with professors and went for visit. During the times, we are inspirited and come up with better ideas and results. These events change our way of thinking, and help us have more comprehensive conclusion.
Forums
Not only do we focus on the future education, but also chasing for a better achievement of our project. During the May, we have invite five professors to our forums to discuss with us about our project ideas. All the professors are have a large stock of knowledge and gave us many useful advises. And the one who affect us most is Professor Yang from Tianjin University, who is one of the leading experts in structure biology in China.
After listen to our whole project idea, professor asked us, why don't we raise the idea up into a theory. According to him, our project is good, but too much simple. He advised us to sum up the main steps of our experiment and put it into reality. Because of the affection from Professor Yang, we formulate our thought and create the Training Protein System which can be used in all the protein enzyme in theory. To test and verify the new system, we put it in use of PETase and finally confirm that the system is valid.
Contact with the PET factory
Polyethyleneterephthalate (PET\PEIT) is the condensation of terephthalic acid and ethylene glycol. PET is fully dense and high crystallinity with ester bond in molecular chain, which is possible degraded. And biodegradation, which means taking advantages of microorganism, such as bacteria and fungus, to degraded plastic, has broad application prospects result from its low cost and high degradation efficiency.
In order to gain more specific data about PET market at present, we called Tianjin Naipu Technology Co., Ltd for help. After a negotiations, opposite side promised us that we can go to their factory for a visit. We go there in August and receive the warm welcome. The manager show us around and introduce the situation about the production, yield, the development of PET industry and so on. When talking about our project, the manager said that the PETase is one of the best ways of PET degradation. And according to our accomplishment with Training Protein System, the value of modified PETase canbe explored more.
In order to gain more specific data about PET market at present, we called Tianjin Naipu Technology Co., Ltd for help. After a negotiations, opposite side promised us that we can go to their factory for a visit. We go there in August and receive the warm welcome. The manager show us around and introduce the situation about the production, yield, the development of PET industry and so on. When talking about our project, the manager said that the PETase is one of the best ways of PET degradation. And according to our accomplishment with Training Protein System, the value of modified PETase canbe explored more.
The talking gives us confident about our project. Before we leaving, manager gave us some PET samples (plastic films and bottles) as a present. Finally we use the bottles into our experiment as a connection of the lab and the reality. The result is on the page of demonstrate.
Click here for more information.
Click here for more information.
Discussion on environmental protection
We made an appointment and visited the Tianjin Environmental Protection Bureau in August. Two solid waste management center staff welcomed us. They introduced how present China dealing with garbage and plastic methods: burning power generation and landfill.
Burning power generation hopes that a large number of plastic can provide carbon source. However, it will produce large amounts of exhaust gas. Landfill will be buried the garbage for 20 years underground, but the soil can no longer be used. It is a waste of land resources.
After understand our main idea about PETase, the staff said, if our biological method is available, land using efficiency will be greatly accelerated. Meanwhile, they argue to the contrary that if the bacteria will affect the land, if farmers use this method to deal with land insulation film, will it cause biological invasion or not. This is the security issue. After discussion, we reached a consensus that it might be no problem. The best situation is the used microbe can be treated with sterilization reagent, and the soil has already have fungi, it will not be affected.
After understand our main idea about PETase, the staff said, if our biological method is available, land using efficiency will be greatly accelerated. Meanwhile, they argue to the contrary that if the bacteria will affect the land, if farmers use this method to deal with land insulation film, will it cause biological invasion or not. This is the security issue. After discussion, we reached a consensus that it might be no problem. The best situation is the used microbe can be treated with sterilization reagent, and the soil has already have fungi, it will not be affected.
The discussion let us realized that our PETase is vital for environment protection, but its not enough. We should be more in-depth thinking about that.
Sponsorship
In order to have more collaboration with companies, we contact with more than one hundred companies, most of which are biotechnology companies. We introduced the iGEM and our project to them and showed our sponsorship proposal in order to make them interested in our team, sponsor fees and provide experimental materials, technology support. There were quite a few companies directly refusing us which made us very depressed at first. In addition, some experts in companies talked with us very friendly and put forward useful suggestions for us although they did not provide financial support. It's believed that collecting the opinions and suggestions of some officials helped us to improve our project, making it more meaningful. Fortunately, a few companies committed to the value of our project and wanted to support us. Finally, Shanxi WeiQiDa Luminosity Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd provides us a capital sum and some samples. Then, Tianjin Naipu Technology Co., Ltd suggested that they can provide us some PET samples and we can also go to their factory for a visit.
During the event of looking for sponsorship, we not only obtained some sponsor fee from the society but made better promotion of iGEM and synthetic biology. Having listened to the opinions of the experts, we can better our project. Additionally, we also harvest a lot of experience and deepen our understanding of our project when going out of school and contacting with workers and experts.
During the event of looking for sponsorship, we not only obtained some sponsor fee from the society but made better promotion of iGEM and synthetic biology. Having listened to the opinions of the experts, we can better our project. Additionally, we also harvest a lot of experience and deepen our understanding of our project when going out of school and contacting with workers and experts.
