Introduction

The Policy and Practices element of our project has asked how iGEM projects can grow from small lab studies into a commercial/industrial/medical product used by many people. An essential part of this research has been thinking about the safety of synthetic biology and specifically of the bioremediation technology we have developed, were it to be in widespread use.

The new risks associated with the growth of our project are broadly similar to those related to synthetic biology generally: the possibility of spread of antibiotic resistance from synthetic organisms into the natural environment, and the possible escape of synthetic organisms into the natural environment. Specific risks associated with out project include the risk to lab workers from working with chlorinated solvents (although this is relatively easy to manage). There may be potential for the abuse of the BioBeads being developed by our team as this technology will allow bacteria to survive in hostile environments. However, we consider that the potential benefits from the application of our design far outweigh any possible risks.

Our bacteria are contained within agarose beads that will control the concentration of DCM which they are exposed to. Eventually these agarose beads will begin to degrade naturally over time, exposing the bacteria to a higher DCM concentration of up to 200 mM. The bacteria will die when the concentration rises above the level they can tolerate, thus we have a kill switch inherently integrated into our design. In addition, the agarose beads will be trapped by a filter within the DCMation container in order to prevent them from being disposed down the sink. Our product will include instructions explaining to users how the beads can be disposed of safely (for example by sterilising with boiling water before disposal).

Bacterial strains

Our team has been working with the following host strains. The table below indicates the risk group the organism belongs to - none of the organisms we worked with confer any risk to human health.

Oxford iGEM 2014