Team:Stanford-Brown/SB16 Practices Exploration

Exploration

As part of our summer experience, we went on plenty of adventures and met cool people! EteRNA Conference, Hackathon, BioCurious (http://biocurious.org/), Star Trek Movie Premiere, Escape Room, Wind Tunnel Tour, etc.

EteRNA

A lot of the work for Biosensing went into the design of our functional oligonucleotides. We experimented with many secondary and tertiary folding softwares to predict their affinity for molecules in binding pockets, but after consulting experts like Christina Smolke, we eventually determined that was not enough. We sought out crowd-sourcing as a means to optimize our aptamer designs. eteRNA is an interactive platform created by Stanford and Carnegie Mellon University that essentially turns RNA folding into a game. Currently, this user-base is attempting to tackle the lingering world health problem of tuberculosis. The site's many features allow users and players to have an in silico lab experience. We participated in the eteRNA Convention on July 16th-17th at the Li Ka Shing Center at Stanford. Mike got quite into the game and is now ranked top 1000 in the world! Check out this example of the IRES-mediated translation biosensor and see if you can meet the thermodynamic constraints of -11.7 kcal/mol necessary for proper folding of the Theophylline aptamer!

BioCurious

We participated in weekly gatherings with a group of biologically-inclined hackers known as BioCurious. We aligned with their mission of creating an open space for biotechnology around Silicon Valley, much like iGEM strives to promote standardized synthetic biology. Not only did we help out with ideation and prototyping a 3D BioPrinter (a device used to print out actual biological objects, such as a leaf), but we also received constructive criticism from biotech experts about our own ideas at NASA.

Female Hackathon

To get some tips on how to design our Wiki and leverage computational tools for our projects, the ladies on our team went to a Hackathon.

Escape The Room/Star Trek Premiere/Wind Tunnel Tour

On the week of the anniversary of NASA's Lunar Landing, we nerded out! First we tackled Kuma Escape Room's "Utopia" in Santa Clara. Our team of 12 conquered this task of puzzles in the 2nd fastest time in history! The next day, NASA showcased a premiere showing of Star Trek Beyond, which we hoped would make our team dynamic live long and prosper. Finally, we toured the world's largest wind tunnel at NASA Ames and were blown away!

Stanford Bioengineering REU Poster Symposium

We also participated in the Stanford BioE REU Poster Symposium on August 5th to interact with other undergraduates do other exciting research in bioengineering and bounce off ideas for how to finish some of our projects in August and September.

Google Visit

We had to pay a few visits to our next door neighbor, Google. Especially since they are such a crucial member in information technology and have special balloon-ing projects within Google X, we found some friends who were willing to give us the tour.

DNA 2.0 Visit

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DNA 2.0 was kind enough to sponsor our chromoprotein investigations, so we paid a trip to their headquarters across the Bay and shared our results. We were also fortunate enough to see the inner-workings of a prestigious biotechnology oligo-synthesis company.