Discussion on current ideas 

BMC drug delivery mechanism, using E-coli to release a drug and act as a ‘smart bomb’  

Was discussed about creating a Bio yoghurt and using BMC to deliver to the gut however was decided that this may not be a commercially viable option as it is being done already using bacteria not BMC. 

Instead it was suggested a simple BMC could be created that contains an antimicrobial peptide.  This would be ingested and the BMC would not be broken down through digestion, protecting the peptide, until it reached the gut where it would naturally be degraded and the antimicrobial peptide released. 

Mark Sheppard suggested creating this type of BMC would be one of the more simple ideas.  Using that as a base a more complex approach could be added to the project.   

If we went with the antimicrobial peptide idea we would need to think of the following; 

Which peptide would we want to use? 

Which organism do we want to target 

What’s the selling point/ novelty of the project? 

Another idea suggested was in the area of Biofuels.  Trying to increase higher yields of Biofuels.  The industry is struggling to produce shorter chains and possibly we could create them using e-coli bacteria. 

This suggestion however was dismissed due to the fact there are better adapted organisms than E-coli such as clostridium already carrying out such work making this idea difficult to pitch to the judges. 

Odours and perfumes was an additional idea bought to the table.  

- MIT in 2006 engineered E-coli to produce banana and mint fragrances at different points of its life cycle.   

- It is suggested we could try and improve existing bio bricks to create perfumes and fragrances that did not work in the past .  

- Ways that we could pitch our fragrance idea to the judges could be;  

- new smells/ novel smells 

- Environmentally friendly – less waste products, renewable source 

- Cheaper to produce than what is on the current market  

- High quality  

Roles within the team

Quick discussion on roles within the team took place and initial roles that have been decided upon are; 

- Taylor and Alex- working on the Wiki 

- Brogan- Working on the lab diary  

- What has been done in the labs? 

This week competent cells were made and transformations on the cells were started.  

It was suggested to test the competent cells with the diluted plasmid cells and kit 

Need to calculate the CFU (colony forming unit)/ plasmid mg- there is a spreadsheet on the igem webpage to help with this.  

Current Events and General points 

1. Sheffield meeting on the 18/07/2014 starts 1pm.  Need 1 or 2 members of the team to go up to Sheffield and provide a short 2 minute presentation of what out project is about.   

2. Funding opportunity from ERASynBio 

3. Next week both Mark and Lisa will be back with the team so it is important to fill in Lisa with what has been happening so she can get up to speed.   

When creating these need to think about the following: 

-Melting temperatures of all the primers are similar 

-They don’t form a self-complementary structure 

-Can the primers self-associate? 

When designing the primers there is online software that can be used  

Was suggested about using light activating promoters and we can change between different fragrances using different light.  This was thought to be a good on-going idea but we need to get the basics sorted out first. 

Also was suggested about thinking about how we could use diffusion calculations to help our project. 

The Teams Wiki 

The Wiki is being worked on by Alex and Taylor, and was decided we should aim for a simple minimalistic approach to the Wiki (the Google effect).  

Was also suggested to stick to creating a wiki rather than a webpage as it is more unusual and may help us to stand out more.   

15.07.14

Notices:

-The lab form has been completed and sent off to iGEM 

-The next safety form is due on Monday 21/7- Alex said he would look over it. 

-Sheffield trip is on Friday 18/07 and Alex and Ellie will be representing the team, need to take lots of photos and try to make connections with other teams. 

Project Work:

Currently got 5 sequences can realistically only afford to sequence 2 genes. £600 maximum budget has been put on the sequences by Wei-Feng. 

So we need to decide on the 2 genes that we are going to synthesize.   

Was strongly urged that we order the sequence in vector form as it will be much easier to handle.  Extra restriction sites need to be added so that the Gibson assembly method can still be used if needed to be. 

Need to also decide on the strain of Ecoli that we want to use, current thoughts that top 10 should be ok and K12 should be sufficient.  

Tasks needed for next week:

-Logo design for the poster and Sheffield presentation needs to be sorted 

-Feedback from the Sheffield meet up 

-Look for recording equipment to help make videos to go on the wiki 

-Need to make a start on the Wiki; upload all files onto the one drive so that it is easy to load everything up onto the Wiki once it is running. 

-Everyone check the sequence that we are sending off 

-Need to carry on with the mini prep and run a gel for the GFP to see if it is present in our extracted cells.

Deadlines:

Safety form draft deadline was met however needs to be improved upon before it can be resubmitted.  It was suggested that we think about how the project would need dsaftey in industry and how safety would have to be adapted for industry. 

15th August the team roster and project description are due in. 

General: 

We did not receive any funding from the ERASynBio  

London YSB 2.0 is on 1/09/14 and 2/09/14 need to have a poster and presentsation prepared.  On the poster our designed Bio brick and sequence needs to be displayed.  Also was suggested that Rosie and Matt would like to present the presentation.   

Everyone does not need to attend both days of the meeting it is up to individuals. 

Travel and accommodation to USA is being sorted out this weekby Wei-Feng.  The team need to send off an email to him with name and DOB as stated on the passport. 

Lab Safety. This week after a visit from Martin Carden it has been highlighted that we need to follow safety rules in the lab. There needs to be two or more people in the lab at all times.  Supervisors for the group are; WFX, Ben or Morena. 

WIKI- Need to get a move on with the wiki as we want to be able to direct people towards the wiki so they can further understand our project.  Taylor and Alex are going to be working on the wiki next week. 

Paris team collaboration- A skype meeting has been set up for Tuesday evening.  Discussion was held about what we want to collaborate about, it was decided to keep our first meeting undetailed and get a sense of what they would like from us and if they seem happy to work with us. 

Givaudan emailed back and are happy to help us, we need to decide again what we would like from them and email them back. WFX suggested we talk with Lee asshe may have some good advice.   

It was discussed about using an odourless Ecoli however Gary Robinson suggested that it would be unnecessary. 

Zingiberene has been ordered and it should take 8-10 days to arrive.   

This week had problems photographing our gels WFX suggested that we need to save them as a JPEG not a TIFF and that if you alter the contrast then should be able to see something.   

By next week:

-Have all components grown up for limonene  

-Attempt the double digests, for this need to find a digest protocol  

-Have a think about computational questions  

-Have made progress with the Wiki 

-Remember to keep growing up new transformed colonies, use single colonies.