Sliver: Dialogue with the public

DNA information storage symbols an innovation technology, and our project perfectly connects the biology technology(B.T.) and information technology(I.T.). Obviously, our software opens a novel way to information storage, promotes the innovation of other technologies in the meantime. It has good influence on science progress, we want to expand the influence to society through human practices. Our activities centered on public engagement, public perception and education.

Public Perception

To learn the extent of the public understands of the technology we were exploring, we interviewed hundreds of citizens. Through the dialogue with the public, we also led them imagine the advanced technology with different sights.

In the investigations, the different opinions people put forward made our Human Practices meaningful and the feedback we received also pushed our project closer to the public.

Here is the video memorized our public engagement:

Having got lots of different feedback, we conducted a more detailed statistical analysis of the survey results. Part of the results of investigation are showed below.

Fig.1.The degree of understanding of Synthetic Biology pie chart.

Fig.2.The degree of different ages understanding of Synthetic Biology bar chart.

Fig.3.The attitudes of people to DNA information storage.

In the past summer, we tried our best to spread the knowledge about Synthetic Biology and influence more people. As the iGEM spirit encouraged us, we are willing to drive more people to what we are doing.

Public Engagement

"Science for all" is a central concept in our human practices.

In addition to do propagandas and put up posters in communities around, we had also done focused and targeted propaganda. we held lectures and activities for students to arouse their interest in science.

Fig.4.We did propagandas for residents in community.

In the lecture, we showed Synthetic Biology and iGEM with stories and videos to almost 300 students in Puyang Middle School.

Fig.5. The lecture we held in Puyang Middle School.

In the lab-open day “To Be Scientist Tomorrow”, students in Grades 6 and 7 accompanied by their parents took part in to do an experiment by extracting DNA from banana.

Fig.6. The students made experiment by themselves.

On September 29th, here comes the 60th birthday of our university. With our project completed, we grasped the anniversary chance to show our achievement.

Fig.7. Introduce our project to the foreign visitors.

Fig.8. A visitor is trying our software.

Besides, we opened a Sina’s microblog which has already attracted 1034 fans, and intended to collect more valuable feedback as well as to push our latest progress to followers.

Fig.9. Our Sina’s microblog account.

Education

For many people, Biology is a subject that they are unfamiliar with. To make more people touch it directly, we combined biological hierarchy concept with the well-known game 2048. We created a new mobile phone game called Bio2048, which encouraged people to learn more about Biology in an entertaining way.

Fig.10.The interface of Bio2048.

We introduced our outcome to students and teachers who were glad to help us access application in class. Puyang lecture was the first time we took Bio2048 to class. Students had high enthusiasm to play our game. After that, we contacted with educational services to try the game in class.

Fig.11.Bio2048 in class.

Evaluation of Our Approach

We had built a bridge between our lab and the public. On the one hand we popularize science to public, on the other hand they gave us sparks of thinking. Having bi-directional effects on our team and the public is what our human practices really want.