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Latest revision as of 09:37, 19 October 2016

A template page

THE TEAM

Our team of ten students consists of molecular biologists, biochemists, chemists, geneticists, biomedical scientists, bioengineers, robotics engineers and economists. All from different walks of life, the cumulative pool of skills and experience is not only diverse, but also very exciting!

Students

Advisors

Supervisors

Sponsors

Wesley Ho

Economist and P+P Co-ordinator of House Dorito-Dog

Wesley is an Economist and describes himself as a noisy character that likes to make sure that we’re all awake at every point of team time. He is passionate about Economics and enjoys teaching everyone and anyone who shows interest (this includes times when we’re all tired at the end of the meetings). He is often overwhelmed by the level of science but always does his best to understand and has become our ‘simplicity seal of approval’ for the scientists. He forms one half of Hansley #WeShipHansley

Hannah Macfarlane

Biomedical Scientist and P+P Co-ordinator of House Hannzilla

Hannah is a part-time Biomedical Scientist, part-time Policy and Practices enthusiast. She is always full of ideas for how we can interview and talk to more patients or people and is also the other half of Hansley (see Wesley above for first half). #WeShipHansley

Wai Ching Lin

Bioengineer and Modelling Expert of House Wai-Ching-For-Love

Wai Ching is a Bioengineering student that loves to model systems and do basically anything and everything computer-related. She is of House Wai-Ching-For-Love because if you replace “Waiting” with “Wai Ching” in Avicii’s song “Waiting For Love”, it actually sounds better. Go on. Try it.

Oana Pelea

Geneticist and Microbiologist of House Flower Fairy

Miss Pelea of House Flower Fairy is our team hipster. She always has a smile on her face and is consistently enthusiastic even when everyone else gets down. Almost devout to the ways of veganism with an exception from our trips to Paris, London and that takeaway… Being of House Flower Fairy, she loves all life and treats her experiments like her babies. She can be very nice but has a fierce streak to be blunt and ask people to get straight to the point. Beating around the bush is NOT an option.

James “you-havin’-a-giggle-mate” Gratton

Control Systems and Robotics Engineer of House Lubricator

James is our Chief Graphics Designer, Wiki Builder and All-Round-Tech-Monkey. He’s the genius behind our logo and our-all-time-provider of British slang...that’s where his middle name comes from. “U wot mate?” He’ would like to think he artistic visionary and is never satisfied with anything artistic. Of House Lubricator (don’t ask), James is one of the three engineers from our team who has also quite recently been known for his obsession with carrots. #JamesAndHisCarrot

Magdelana Dabrowska

Biochemist and Head Microbiologist of House Vodka

Magda is the mama of the Microbiology. Yes, you heard us. She always seems to know exactly what she’s doing and can be seen dashing around the lab working on the team’s next bacterial monstrosity. Due to her Polish heritage and her belonging to House Vodka, she has acquired a high tolerance of alcohol, in particular vodka. Magda is always keen on sharing this talent with the rest of the teams on socials, even if they cannot possibly take another shot! Note to self: Do NOT enter a drinking contest with her.

Jamie "Jaimito" Grimshaw

Molecular Biologist and Modeller of House Sly Fox

Jamie is the calm and collected kid of the group. Of House Sly Fox, Jamie likes to play the Devil's Advocate in team discussions. In the man’s own words, “I am innately boring, but not to the point where that is particularly interesting.”

Jake Edmans

Chemist of House Troll

Jake, of House Troll, is the chemistry expert of the group. But, he'll frequently don a disguise and work alongside the biologists, "Day 33, and they still suspect nothing." Jake will happily eat his whole meal and then take ALL leftover food donations from everyone else in the group.

Saylee Jangam

Bioengineer and Device Expert of House Jennifer

The Social Media Queen of the group, Saylee, has an endless list of contacts that she can talk to about the project. She is always pushing the team to be lively and even more social (even if most of them want a quiet night in to themselves). In Paris, Saylee found her belonging to her long-lost House, House Jennifer. For those who don’t already know, Jen is her not-so-annoying alter ego. Don’t worry, you’ll come across her in Boston.

Brandon Ford

Molecular Biologist of House Glow-in-the-Dank

Brandon is a Molecular Biologist and our team’s very own Pun Generator. He is sometimes known as the Brandopedia for his approximate knowledge of many things. When asked about his “inner funk”, his answer was “I would say that my skin is very good at keeping my inner funk inside where it belongs, but when that fails, I use a plaster or bandage.” Brandon is a dispenser of accurate and valuable information and in general, a complete know-it-all cool dude.

Dimitrios Michailidis

House of Broccoli

Dimitrios is a microbiologist, with a obsession to find out what inspires people. When asked how he got involved with iGEM, he said, "I was presented in front of a panel of 3 agents, they might have just been professors. Frank Sinatra – I mean Frank Sargent of the United Nations, I mean University of Dundee, was staring at me through his dark sunglasses. Cigar in mouth. Next to him, his wife Tracy aka Scarlet, fresh from a saloon performance, and Tywin Lannister. I mean Tywin (Dyce Davidson) is a really nice guy after getting past his scary-looking face. Give him a beer, and he will go crazy at an iGEM party from starting a conga line to throwing an inflatable donkey to the DJ (who was also an iGEM judge)." He got so addicted to iGEM after being in a team in 2014, that he helped out the next team in 2015 in Dundee. Even when he came down to Sheffield for his PhD, there was no stopping him! Since there was no ongoing iGEM team at Sheffield, he just made his own!

Guilherme Kundlatsch

House of Brazil

A 19-year-old Brazilian Biotechnology student on a year-long exchange programme studying Molecular Biology at the University of Sheffield, Guilherme is a former handball player, former chess player, former writer, former iGEMmer and a dreamer, still searching for his place on this pale blue dot. Guilherme is always looking for his next, big adventure. “Let’s climb that sea-cliff? I’m in! Let’s dive in that waterfall in the middle of a mountain lost in the jungle? Count me in! Let’s do some sea kayaking during a crazy storm? I’ll be there!”. He has traveled to around 19 countries in 4 different continents doing crazy stuff – and he’s still working on this list. In his free time, he likes to write and his first book (a science fiction adventure) was published last year. He is also the only adviser not currently doing his PhD at the University of Sheffield – impressive stuff at just 20!

Kyle Buchan

House of Freedom

Kyle is a Microbiologist, professional science enthusiast, and a general all-round nerd. He got into this line of work when he sat down one day (around the same time he was told that the mitochondria were the powerhouse of cells) and realised that wee stuff was cool, partly because it could kill you, partly because it’s invisible and partly because there’s more of it inside you than there have ever been humans! His iGEM story started three years ago, when he was a ne’er do well Microbiology undergrad in his third year at the University of Dundee. They designed and developed a project called ‘Toximop!’ which involved E. coli engineered to soak up a common toxin in water bodies – microcystin. “Since then I have helped to start the Sheffield iGEM team, who are going to blow your minds with Iron and Blood!” he adds.

Felix Weihs

House of Thesis Panic

Felix is a 3rd year PhD student in Sheffield working on round bacteria around their roundness (actually true). To be able to cover his travel plans (he has one continent left!), he needs money and time. He thinks there is no worse plan than doing science research and if he thinks about it, he is doing something wrong. “Time to get a real job…” When asked how he got involved with iGEM, his answer was “Every team needs a German. It just works better this way.”

John Howard

House of Jukebox

John is a 1st year PhD student in the Department of Biomedical Science and the Department of Chemical & Biological Engineering who works on chemically improving RNA interference in insects. John originally did his undergrad in Chemical Engineering with Biotechnology, but decided hi-vis vests and hard hats didn’t really suit him, so traded in his distillation column for a pipette. John was roped into iGEM by Kyle’s “please help out with iGEM” presentation, where he’s pretty sure that Kyle used Jedi mind tricks to convince him….John is a musical nutter who plays the piano, saxophone, organ, mouth organ, oboe, spoons, paper and comb, empty beer bottles and pretty much any other musical instrument that happens to be passing, and has a some say lovable (some say annoying) tendency to break into song at the slightest provocation.

Nicholas R Moody

House of literally anything else

Nick is the advisor chemist. He is fascinated by the interface between biology and chemistry; life evolved using a minute amount of specific chemicals in specific conditions. Living organisms built instructions in DNA and molecular machines to control its environment and keep the essentials processes working. Multicellular system can sometimes seem almost mind boggling. Understanding how fundamental chemistry interacts with the madness of life is what drives his personal fascination with science.He got involved with iGEM through Kyle, one of the other advisers. “Kyle and I both play in the university brass band,” he says, “We were both in the pub after a concert when he ambushed me, the idea of looking at an interdisciplinary project seemed fascinating, I could hardly say no!”

Jonny Coates

House of Shark

“I love what I do. Being on the very edge of what is known and unknown and bring the first person to discover something that no previous person has ever known is amazing,” says Jonny, “the child-like curiosity with the world never went away, it just matured into asking more questions.” He believes he is lucky enough to do a job where not only does he get to continue asking questions about the world but also gets to go out and find the answers. When asked about how he got involved with iGEM, he said, “Kyle. It was all his fault…”. Jonny isn’t your stereotypical scientist. When he’s not in the lab, he can be found doing a range of somewhat dangerous activities (motorcycles, skydiving, climbing…anything at the more extreme end of things).

Carlos Luna

House of Salsa

Carlos shared with us that when he’s not eating tacos (not from Tacobell at least), he’s engineering super intelligent systems for automatic control. His high tech robots will one day rule the world – save – I mean save the world. It’s not like the ‘Grey Hats’ are using his surreal programming skills for their own gains. When asked how he got involved, Carlos shared with us “That guy called Leon – I mean Dimitrios – Leon is his shadow – friend! – I meant friend, got me all fired up about iGEM”. Carlos disclosed a few words about Dimitrios’ approach of recruiting him. “There was a lot of pestering, nagging, stalking, and whispering”. Many people try to scout him to recruit his inquisitive – if he says so himself – mind.

Dr. Dorian Florescu

House of Florescu

Dorian is a fresh postdoctoral researcher at the University of Sheffield in the department of Automatic Control and Systems Engineering. He supports the team by giving advice on mathematical modelling. When asked about how he got involved with iGEM, he said “I heard about the competition from Dimitrios and it instantly caught my attention!"

Professor Visakan Kadirkamanathan

Professor Kadirkamanathan is the Director of the Rolls-Royce University Technology Centre at the University of Sheffield and former Head of the Department of Automatic Control and Systems Engineering. His research interests lie in signal and information processing in areas of Intelligent Systems, Decision and Control related topics at the Rolls-Royce University Technology Centre. Some of his work is also within the Centre for Signal Processing and Complex Systems. As our supervisor, he has advised us on building our device and modeling our system.

Professor David Hornby

Dave Hornby is a professor of Biochemistry in the Department of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology at the University of Sheffield. He is our primary supervisor and has been with the team since first started. His research interests lie in developing analytical methods for genomics and proteomics, expanding the functional repertoire of natural macromolecular assemblies and remodeling enzymes and toxins. As our supervisor, he has advised us on presentation technique and the science behind our project.

Professor Daniel Coca

Professor Coca is the Head of the Department of Automatic Control and Systems Engineering at the University of Sheffield. As a professor, he teaches in the area of nonlinear and complex systems. His research interests lie in developing novel mathematical, computational and analytical methods to analyse, model and control complex dynamical systems as well as apply the tools developed to complex systems in physics, engineering, life sciences and finance. As our supervisor, he has advised us on creating a suitable model for our reporter system.

We would like to extend a massive thank you to the following people and organizations in making this project possible:

The University of Sheffield

The University of Sheffield is a research university in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England. It received its royal charter in 1905 as successor to the University College of Sheffield, which was established in 1897 by the merger of Sheffield Medical School (founded in 1828), Firth College (1879) and Sheffield Technical School (1884). At present day, the University of Sheffield is in the top 10 per cent of all UK universities, according to the results of the 2014 Research Excellence Framework (REF).

Faculty of Science

Department of Biomedical Science, Department of Chemistry, Department of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology

The Faculty of Science is the home of science at the University of Sheffield. It is made up seven departments that span the classical science subjects of biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics and psychology. We are dedicated, through our research, to understanding ourselves, our world and its place in the universe. At the same time, we are training a new generation of experts to find solutions to the problems that science can solve.

Faculty of Engineering

Department of Automatic Control and Systems Engineering, Interdisciplinary Programmes Office and Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering

At Sheffield we’re passionate about developing world-leading engineering professionals. Our teaching brings together the fundamental scientific knowledge that underpins engineering with the creative thinking and problem-solving skills to create outstanding engineers.Through cutting-edge research and strong partnerships with industry leaders globally, such as Boeing, Siemens and Rolls-Royce, our academics tackle the biggest challenges facing the modern world through an increasingly collaborative and multidisciplinary approach.

Faculty of Social Sciences

Department of Economics

The Faculty of Social Sciences has a longstanding reputation for delivering world class research. Our research addresses the major challenges facing society and our ideas are leading academic debates internationally and shaping policy and practice across the globe.

Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health

Department of Infection, Immunity and Cardiovascular Diseases

The Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health is one of the major UK centres for education and research in health and related subjects. With origins dating back to 1828, the faculty has a long-standing tradition of excellence in clinical education and research.

Alumni Fund Foundation

The University of Sheffield

The Alumni Fund helps provide talented students with access to a first-class education they would otherwise be unable to afford, whilst maintaining and further enhancing standards at the University for future generations of students. Donations to the Alumni Fund support our students' academic and personal development, and give them the opportunity to develop skills and knowledge that will serve them throughout their lives.

Insigneo Institute of in silico Medicine

The University of Sheffield

The Insigneo Institute for in silico Medicine is a collaborative initiative between the University of Sheffield and Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. The Institute came into existence on 28 May 2012, distributing its charter and registering its first members. Insigneo is a member of several alliances between research intensive universities such as the White Rose University Consortium, EPSRC Centre for Multiscale Soft Tissue Mechanics and the N8 Research Partnership.

University of Sheffield Enterprise

University of Sheffield Enterprise (USE) seeks to stimulate new ideas and supports students and graduates of the University to make their entrepreneurial ideas happen, through a programme of activities including: business coaching, advice, seed funding and incubation space.

BBSRC

Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) is a UK Research Council and NDPB and is the largest UK public funder of non-medical bioscience. It predominantly funds scientific research institutes and university research departments in the UK. Receiving its funding through the science budget of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS), BBSRC's mission is to "promote and support, by any means, high-quality basic, strategic and applied research and related postgraduate training relating to the understanding and exploitation of biological systems"

The Doctoral Academy

The University of Sheffield

As a PhD student at the University of Sheffield you are part of our Doctoral Academy. You're welcomed into a supportive community and treated as a colleague. You’ll gain free, personalized skills training, expert careers advice and become part of an inspiring, collaborative group of researchers from across the disciplines.

The Grantham Centre for Sustainable Futures

The University of Sheffield

The Grantham Centre for Sustainable Futures is an ambitious and innovative collaboration between the University of Sheffield and the Grantham Foundation for the Protection of the Environment. Our sustainability research creates knowledge and connects it to policy debates on how to build a fairer world and save natural resources for future generations.

New England Biolabs

New England Biolabs (NEB) produces and supplies recombinant and native enzyme reagents for the life science research, as well as providing solutions supporting genome editing, synthetic biology and next-generation sequencing. NEB also provides free access to research tools such as REBASE, InBASE, and Polbase.

Prof David Hornby

The University of Sheffield

Dave Hornby is a professor of Biochemistry in the Department of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology at the University of Sheffield. He is our primary supervisor and has been with the team since first started. His research interests lie in developing analytical methods for genomics and proteomics, expanding the functional repertoire of natural macromolecular assemblies and remodeling enzymes and toxins. As our supervisor, he has advised us on presentation technique and the science behind our project.

Prof Mike Hounslow

Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Engineering

Mike is a chemical engineer with BE and PhD degrees from the University of Adelaide in South Australia. He is a Chartered Engineer and Fellow of the Institution of Chemical Engineers and a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering.

Prof Visakan Kadirakamanathan

Engineering for Life

Professor Kadirkamanathan is the Director of the Rolls-Royce University Technology Centre at the University of Sheffield and former Head of the Department of Automatic Control and Systems Engineering. His research interests lie in signal and information processing in areas of Intelligent Systems, Decision and Control related topics at the Rolls-Royce University Technology Centre. Some of his work is also within the Centre for Signal Processing and Complex Systems. As our supervisor, he has advised us on building our device and modeling our system.

Dr. Sandrine Soubes

The University of Sheffield

Dr Sandrine Soubes is the Researcher Development Manager in the Faculty of Science at the University of Sheffield. Sandrine has many interests concerned with academic practices and communities, such as the development of interdisciplinary research practices or the creation of peer-support communities for researchers. Sandrine is a steering group member of the Women@TUOS network and has a strong personal commitment towards enhancing the support for women researchers at the University.