Human Practices Projects of CryptoGErM
Beyond the lab… To the understanding of the world
Science is not an isolate entity, it is dynamical because it influences and it is influence by other fields. Science is part of a complex society, and as a result of this relationship it is important to explore ethically and objectively all the social aspects related to the development of a scientific project.
When carrying on a project, we must not forget that we want to impact society, make a change based on its necessities and offer solutions to current problems that affect it, but at the same time, we have to take care of protecting our environment by performing experiments consciously. Besides that, as a part of a society, we must obey legal legislations to preserve the order and the safety within the community. As it can be seen, science is not limited to the work in a laboratory; it implies a real understanding of the world.
We decided to divide CrypoGErM Human Practices into small projects called Social (Contact with experts and society) Legal (Understanding current legislations) Educational (Approach students) Outreach (Approach society to promote synthetic biology and our Project) and Future scenarios (Deep understanding of the implications of using our system). The activities carried on by CryptoGErM are linked intrinsically between each other and with the whole project itself and they represent an understanding of different social fields, of how this understanding was integrated to shape our project.
Each of the activities started with a quote, to wake up your curiosity and give you a general perspective of the activities carried on for each project. So we invite you to take a look and discover with us why CryptoGErM goes beyond the lab… To an understanding of the world
Social
The project started as an idea for the storing of sensitive information. Throughout the development of the project, we got in contact with experts from the National Institutions of our country to know which are the current challenges in the area of cyber security, and what would be the requirements that a system for the storing and sending of information must fulfill; we took this to shape our project. Also, we interviewed with a potential user that might use our system for the long-term storing of information. Finally, we carried on a global survey to know what are the current perceptions about synthetic biology, cybersecurity and storing of information of information and shaped our project based on those results.
Legal
Is the sending of GMOs well regulated nowadays? What is the current legislation in the Netherlands, Europe and the whole world under what our system? We looked into the existing National and International legislations for the sending of GMOs for the design of the sending part of our project.
Educational
We received 115 students to do an activity called BIO-Art! Painting with bacteria, to get them in contact with synthetic biology if a fun and interactive way, besides that, we gave a lecture on synthetic biology and our project to these future scientists. But besides that, we went deeper in our educational activities; we were the mentors of 9 High School students that developed practical work in our laboratory for their High School Thesis.
Outreach
One of our main goals is to make part of our project as many people as possible. For such goal, we got interview by the local radio from the North of the Netherlands and several newspapers dedicated articles to our project; including an article and a video from the Dutch National News Agency!. Also, we gave a workshop during the Campus Party 2016 in the city of Utrecht, the Netherlands to young scientists promoting synthetic biology, iGEM and CryptoGErM.
Future
What would be the repercussions of having a digitally “uncrackable” system? Is the society ready for such a system? How the current storing and sending of information would be changed by the introduction of our system? We explored future fictional scenarios that illustrates the potential applications of introducing our project to the market, these scenarios are based on current and real evidence
