Outreach at South by Southwest (SXSW)

Special thanks to Karen Ingram for giving us this amazing opportunity to participate at SXSW Create 2014!

Ella collecting a coffee sample from Austin Java.

In the spring of 2014, Karen Ingram invited the UT Austin iGEM team to present at South by Southwest (SXSW) 2014 Create. The SXSW festival is an annual set of music, film, and interactive events in Austin. The Create event was an interactive event that showcases up-and-coming maker/hacker/DIY culture. There were a few new team members, so we saw this as an opportunity to not only teach the new members essential research techniques, but also to reach out to the community and raise awareness for the emerging field of synthetic biology. We decided to revive a previous iGEM project, "Caffeinated Coli," and thought it would be interesting to measure the caffeine content of various different local house coffees. Such a project would give us a platform to engage the wider community on the topic of synthetic biology, and hopefully serve to better inform people about the potential benefits of synthetic biology and its applications. We were very happy with the feedback we received.

Caffeinated Coli

Jordan discussing our project with Matt Bolick, co-owner of Flat Track Coffee

Click here for an interactive map of coffee shops we visited!

Previously, the UT Austin iGEM team created and used the caffeinated coli to measure the caffeine content in beverages such as soda and energy drinks. The 2012 team had originally set out with the intent on creating a bacteria that could measure caffeine poisioning in rivers downstream from chocolate factories, but modified their objectives as the project matured. Their results showed that these engineered E. coli were very accurate at detecting the levels of caffeine in formula-based drinks. We wondered how well caffeinated coli would do with something different, something that the vast majority of people in the city of Austin drink on a regular basis, coffee.

The Austin Independent Business Alliances' slogan of "Keep Austin Weird," is a widely shared sentiment of Austinites, and emphasizes the need to promote local businesses. Thus, we thought it would be a great community outreach project to work with local Austin coffee shops, and do our part to "Keep Austin Weird!". Jordan, a senior member of the group, assembled a map of about 40 local coffee shops in Austin. The team split up one weekend to visit the coffee shops, collecting samples of their house coffee. Relevant to medal requirements, our team was very diligent about explaining the nature of our science and how it relates to synthetic biology before, during, and after collecting coffee samples. In addition, we were very aware of ethical issues when interacting with the public. We informed each shop when, where, and how the caffeinated coli data would be used, and we fully respected the wishes of those who requested that their involvement not be made public. This being said, in the vast majority of cases we were met with much enthusiasm by the coffee shop owners and employees, whose interest had been piqued when we described our experiment, often resulting in discussions of science, synthetic biology, and coffee.

Back at the lab, the team members got to work. Senior members divided their attention to mentor the new members in the techniques necessary to start cultures, work with the lab equipment, and other general laboratory safety.

The beginning of something great! Special thanks to Razan Alnahhas (second row, right) for mentoring and to Mike Hammerling (not pictured) and Ashley Kessel (second row, left) for assistance in sample collection.

Doing the Science

Cultures of knockout strain grown with collected coffee samples.

Standard growth curve of knockout strain grown with different amounts of caffeine.

The E. coli we used are an engineered strain, previously made by the 2012 UT Austin iGEM team. This strain has had its normal guanine synthesis pathway knocked out, but contains a plasmid with a set of genes that enables the organism to synthesize guanine from a number of xanthines, including caffeine. Without caffeine (or other xanthines), the strain cannot grow. When caffeine is added, the engineered strain can demethylate the caffeine molecules yielding xanthine, and from there the E. coli can synthesize guanine. The culture then grows normally until the caffeine in the sample is completely metabolized, at which point the cells can no longer synthesize guanine, and cease to grow. Thus, by looking at the relative growth of the strain with different samples of coffee and comparing it to a standard curve of growth in solutions with known amounts of caffeine, we could reliably measure the amount of caffeine in the coffee.

Measuring Caffeine Content

The protocol was simple: we provided our caffeinated coli with a diluted sample of coffee we had acquired from the various shops, and then compared the relative growth of each culture by measuring the absorbance at 600 nm (OD₆₀₀). The simplicity of the project was the key to its success. It provided a glimpse into the exciting new world of synthetic biology for the new members and allowed them to learn vital skills that were used in day to day research during the summer. Our results can be seen in Figure 1, below.

Figure 1. Relative levels of caffeine in house coffee samples from around Austin. Data depict the amount of caffeine in the coffee relative to the average caffeine content for all samples tested, as determined using the Caffeinated Coli.

Presenting the Science

In March 2014, we presented this data set at the SXSW festival. As part of this outreach, we explained our project and synthetic biology to a wide range of people. Many people who came by had little to no background in science or technology, and those who did did not have a thorough understanding of what synthetic biology was or how it could be helpful. By discussing our experiments with bacteria and coffee, an interesting and easy-to-understand application, we were able to explain the basic concepts of synthetic biology and how it can be used in a beneficial way. Occasionally, these conversations would branch out into wider topics of science and technology. We feel this is a far better way for the public to learn about synthetic biology than from rumors about GMOs.

Community Response

Table at SXSW

People were particularly interested in the different types of coffee that yielded unexpected results or results that clashed with preconceptions. For example, we tested a light roast and dark roast from the same coffee shop, Epoch. Most people, when asked if they knew the difference between the roasts, would respond that the "dark/light roast had more caffeine", but in reality the caffeine content in the two roasts was indistinguishable; the light roast had a tiny bit more—but not enough to claim a significant difference.

Despite the insignificant difference, there were many hypotheses presented by passers by about why the light roast in our experiment had seemingly more caffeine than the dark roast. Some people claimed that longer roasting destroyed the caffeine (and swore by cold-press coffee), and some people guessed that perhaps the dark roast sample had less coffee beans in it when it was brewed. Nevertheless, after much research by the team after the event, it was concluded that coffee roasting and coffee brewing are largely variable processes, and caffeine content can vary significantly from batch to batch of beans. For more information about light roast vs. dark roast see this article at Scribblers Coffee, which discusses the nuances between the two.

Coffee bean counting contest

People were also extremely curious as to why the Wright Bros. Brew & Brew sample had a significantly higher amount of caffeine. This data point resulted in one of the owners of Wright Bros. Brew & Brew contacting us to understand our process of determining caffeine content and why they were so far outside the mean. The owner, Matt Wright, concluded, after discussing our project and the coffee brewing process (and consulting with employees), that the specific pot of coffee was probably just not fully drained, i.e. there was less water in the batch than normal, resulting in a higher caffeine per volume content. This was just a starting point though, as the conversation with Mr. Wright spanned the entire process of making coffee, quality control, and a little bit of the science behind the process. It also developed a nice contact point for a future continuation of science and coffee.

Similar conversations involving science, synthetic biology, coffee, and the community occurred throughout the entire SXSW event. The various coffee shop owners and baristas were curious if they could employ science to help them make a better drink or a more customizable product. Some of the SXSW attendees were in the coffee making business and were interested in thinking about whether such science could be used to understand where the caffeine goes during each step in the coffee-making process.

Additionally, a number of individuals who home brew coffee or kombucha or other organic drinks, such as tea, wondered if this technology could be used to cheaply and quickly test their samples to determine the amount of caffeine they have in their home brews. We, of course, said yes!

To involve everyone attending the event and raise more awareness for the iGEM team, we held a contest in which patrons attending the event could enter to win an E. coli plush upon following us on Twitter.

Impact on Synthetic Biology

This community outreach project presented the team with an opportunity to dispel misoconceptions the public has about the field of syntetic biology and our work with genetically modified organisms. We worked to show people the benefits of GMOs, such as the application our caffeinated coli, which were originally created in 2012 with bioremediation in mind. By presenting the science in a fun and easily digestible manner, members of the general public could see synthetic biology in a new light.

The challenge of accurately detecting caffeine in biological products is fascinating, and we hope to further refine our methods in the future, as we cannot currently fully differentiate between caffeine and certain other xanthines. Hopefully, we will be able to reach out again next year and develop an even better synthetic biology application.

SXSW Adventure in Photographs (hover over image for captions!)