Team:HIT-Harbin/Safety

1.material level

There are 3 types of the biological material we have used this year, which are carriers, engineering bacteria and target fragments. Sources of these materials were igem standard library, synthesis and donation from our professor. In the "check in" section, we have backup all the coding protein sequences and obtained the license as well. We will analysis the detail of the safety of material point by point in the paragraphs below.

Strain: The strains for carrier expression we used this year are E.coli DH5α and yeast BY4741, of which the biological threat level is 1. They are known as harmless microbes, especially the common strains of yeast for brewing, which is a kind of edible strains, whose history of safe using can be traced back to 3000 years ago.

Carrier: In the experiment of submitting and enzyme-cutting and linking up, we used PSB1C3, which has proved to be harmless, as the operating carrier to should the official requirement. In the transduction of yeast, we used PRS304 and PRS306 as the carrier, which are commonly used in biological experiment. The carrier is of ammonia benzyl resistance, containing no dangerous pathogenic sequence.

Purpose: we used TEF2 and the optimized Lexaop + cyc1 as the promoter, and TADH as the separant and the terminator. They are common promoters and terminators in the yeast, with no virulence genes. In addition, lexa DBD is widely used as a common DNA binding protein, and ECFP is also a commonly used fluorescent protein. Moreover, mdr521 Mdr83-805-805 is the polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBS) receptor protein of mice , which widely exists in animals and has no pathogenic effect to people and livestock. To sum up, in the use of genetic materials, our project is absolutely safe.

2.application level

The track of our project this year is the environment. In terms of environment, we focus on the enrichment, detection and degradation of the serious chemical pollution, dioxin, in the environment. And that made our project an environmentally friendly project.

Compared with the previous methods of dioxin detection, such as enzyme-linked immunoassay and HRGC/HRMS, this project has advantages of low cost, safety, wide application and open nature. For details, please see the Project Advantages.

And, of course, this project is still in its developing and perfecting process, and the related researches and tests are only available in the laboratory for now. So we conducted strict monitoring of the safety of the laboratory and make sure the experimental staffs do their job. We never allow emissions of liquid waste and experimental equipment from the lab without sterilization.

3.safety software

Although every year we fill out the safety form as well as the “check in”, the safety of the parts is still what we're focused on. The existing detection methods about the safety of parts of igem is subjective to a certain degree, and the screening and safety assessment to the parts one by one take a lot of energy of staff and teams. We read some relevant paper concerning about safety and integrated the existing resources to develop the GENE Sequence Corporation, software aimed at safety test. Once you input the parts to be submitting in the interface, the software will compare this sequence with the related toxic protein sequences in the database, thus determine the safety of the parts submitted. In addition, the software can achieve the function of maximum retention of functional protein sequence and elimination of toxicity of the toxic protein sequences.

Wechat Platformlevel

1.1 Overview

Hitgem is a portable type of inquiry platform for biosafety in microbiological and biomedical laboratories designed for iGemers and some researchers, based on Tencent weChat.

It has pros as follows: a)Users on mobile phone, PC, and iPad can get access to it since it is established via weChat; b)WeChat has its great amount of users so that this platform can be spread out rapidly; c)IGemers can check out the biosafety regulations about experiments anytime.

1.2 Background

The biosafety of synthetic biology is gathering people’s attention. What’s more, it is a must for every undergraduate team to give out instruction and guidance about safety. Meanwhile, weChat is an instant messaging software developed by Tencent China, whose weChat public platform offers API ports and has over hundred million users all over the world, such that it becomes the first choice as a portable publicizing means.

1.3 Guidance

1.3.1 Log in your weChat account

1.3.2 Choose Add Contacts, enter hitgem and search

1.3.3 Tap Follow button, then you will receive a greeting and brief instruction from hitgem

1.3.4 Type in safety to get the contents of biosafety handbook

1.3.5 Enter the corresponding number of the info you want to know, then you will get the details

1.3.6 If you want info about other blocks, just change the entered number