Team Collaboration

iGEM at Jiangsu Normal University

For this year’s competition, our team collaborated with the iGEM Team at Jiangsu Normal University.

JSNU’s project aims at applying anthocyan to a potential cancer therapy. Their early experiments were conducted based on the HEK293T where has a low expression of KLF4 compare with GES1. To better test their idea,various cancer cell lines were required for the further explorations. However, when they turned to work on the cancer cells, they realized that later cell generations (normally after the fifth generation) could be applied better in the test, but not commercialized cancer cell clones.Additionally, due to the high expense of the cell clone as well as the long time period of the cell culture, it seemed impossible for the team to conducted their further experiments in cancer cells within the time frame necessary.So we supplied them with a ninth generation of Hela cell line which we just had for our previous idea. They repeated their experiment among several varieties of cancer cell lines including Hela to see if their project can be realized on these cancer cells. However, The Hela cell seemed to be a little overexpressive of KLF4 that did not fit the situation well. Last but not least, the Hela cell became an indivisible part in their project and gave them new think.

Thankfully, our team just had the hela cell clone (the ninth generation) in stock which was originally prepared for our previous idea for the iGEM competition. Also, benefiting from some of the group members’ professional skills in cell culture, the cell clone demonstrated good viability. In response to the emergency request from the iGEM at JSNU, we very soon prepared the cell samples according to their needs, and sent the materials immediately.

Meanwhile, the wiki-design team at JSNU provided us assistance in creating avatars, where they drew a serious of cartoon bacteria characters based on the real photos of our team members. These avatars are used and also can be seen at the Team session on our wiki page.

iGEM at Tsinghua University

This year, our team launched the collaboration with the iGEM team at Tsinghua University.

To better illustrate our biofilm-based platform strategy, the wiki-design team at Tsinghua University helped us to depict the brief mechanism of our project in a cartoon style. This figure are used and also can be seen at the (where do we use the picture) on our wiki page.

Propagation of iGEM - iGEM Day for Public Interests (iDPI)

Aiming at spreading the iGEM as well as contributing to the local community, ShanghaiTech iGEM Day for Public Interests (iDPI) was found in 2016, along with the establishment of the first ever iGEM team at ShanghaiTech University. The iDPI at ShanghaiTech is set up to encourage every iGEM team to dedicate themselves not only into scientific researches, but also social practices. Sciences and technologies are used to serve people ant the society; therefore the awareness to contribute to the social interests is of equal importance with the research explorations. This year, iDPI collaborated with Shanghai Coordinate International School, holding an iGEM Lab Open House Day on Zhangjiang campus.

The activity took place in the early September. At noon time, alone with another iGEM team at ShanghaiTech, our iGEM team members warmly welcomed the visiting delegation from Shanghai Coordinate International School at the conference room. Leaded by Dr. (Name), a leading science teacher at the Coordinate, the delegation consisted of 8 high school students from different grades.

An introduction speech to the ShanghaiTech was first delivered by the team member Haolong. Then he continued to further talked about the background of iGEM as well as synthetic biology. After that, delegates from two of the iGEM team conducted a brief presentation on the iGEM project subsequently. Finally an open discussion session was held, where the high school students demonstrated strong interests about synthetic biology and actively asked questions about the iGEM and our projects. Some of them even showed strong willingness to participate in the iGEM in the following year. As we responded at the meeting, we would be very happy to try to provide all sorts of assistance they may need to build up their own high school team for the iGEM. Also, if any of them were interested in real experience of hand-on lab operations, our iGEM lab was always open to them to visit and explore. Additionally, last week we were just informed by (Name) that their school would be very likely to build up their first-ever high school iGEM team; hopefully they may officially participate in the competition in the following years. We would keep providing them sufficient assistance and support as long as necessary.

After the speech and discussion, a lab visiting was scheduled as the second session of the Open House Day. Our team members paired with the visiting high school students, guiding them around the research center at school. We introduced the equipment to them one by one, from the cell disruptor to the ultra centrifuge, from the FACS to TEM, explaining the mechanisms behind in popular and easy-to-understand language. Part of our lab results were demonstrated as well, so as to help them build a better understanding on our projects.

The Open House Day ended around 6 in the evening. As one of the visiting students commented, this lab tour was very impressive and amazing which greatly aroused his curiosity to explore the secrets of nature. And this was just the core value shared by iDPI to pass the knowledge and inspire the interests to the next young generations.