Victor Valcovici School, Romania

A member of our team visited the Victor Valcovici school in Galati, Romania, where children aged 6 to 10 participated in our workshop, entitled “Scientist for a Day”. They were given activity packs designed by the York iGEM team that included leaflets with information on bacteria and synthetic biology, educational games and a file with paper bacterial organelles that they could use to invent their own useful bacteria. The kids were very receptive and ingenious, their ideas – some more realistic than others – ranging from using fluorescent bacteria as a compass to creating scented bacteria that can be used in the production of bio-perfumes.

Researchers' Night 2014, York

European researchers night is an annual family friendly event that takes place simultaneously in over three hundred cities across Europe. This year the event was on Friday, 26th September and York was lucky enough to be selected as a host venue for this event in the UK.

We were lucky enough to be asked to take part in this event and showcase our work for iGEM, this was done in several different ways. We had members of our team at the researchers cafe, where members of the public are able to come and talk in depth to researchers about all aspects of their project. This gave us the opportunity to communicate on a one to one basis with the public so they were able to raise any questions they have relating to our project or GMOs in general. Team members were also engaging the public on a more practical level with DNA extraction. We aided members of the public in extracting their own DNA using everyday household products, they were then able to take their extracted DNA home with them. Furthermore we had two members of our team presenting at the event specifically talking about our iGEM project.

YSB 2.0

This September, our team has participated in the 2nd edition of the Young Synthetic Biologists’ Conference, held in London. The conference offered a platform for iGEM teams to present their projects and get feedback and advice from other teams as well as from career synthetic biologists. Our members appreciated the opportunity to practice their presentation in preparation for the Giant Jamboree in Boston and enjoyed sharing their iGEM experience with teams from other universities. This has also helped us establish a collaboration with the Imperial College London iGEM team, as our projects both aim to use phytochelatins as a means towards improved water treatments.

University of Sheffield Meetup

In June, two of the team attended a meetup hosted by the University of Sheffield’s iGEM team. The day consisted of presentations and poster sessions as well as giving us the chance to meet members from the universities of Oxford, Kent, Norwich and Sheffield. The day gave us a chance to start considering potential collaborations with other teams as well as gaining valuable tips and advice from much more experienced iGEM members and alumni.

Our Event for Sponsors and Academics

On October 10th 2014, our team held an event for the sponsors of the iGEM York team, as well as for the academics from the University of York. Members of our team gave a brief presentation outlining the overview of our project which was followed by a short Q and A session. After the talk, we took the opportunity to discuss the progress of our project with our sponsors.