Outreach and Human Practices

The Missouri S&T iGEM team is highly involved in outreach and human practices events on our campus, in our community, and within our region of the state. It is our goal to use these events to build awareness about our team and our role in promoting research in the field of synthetic biology. We have hosted educational events, ethical discussions, and outreach events to recruit new members. If you would like more information involving our team’s outreach activities, please contact our Public Relations Officer, Katie Nelson at klnyb5@mst.edu.

Exploring Synthetic Biology

Exploring Synthetic Biology is an annual event that we use to educate the campus body about synthetic biology and its applications. At this event, we describe our team, the basics of how synthetic biology research is conducted, and how this knowledge can be used to better our world. To better facilitate the students’ understanding of the subject we had them perform several hands-on activities such as a wheat germ DNA extraction and a simple pipe cleaner plasmid modeling exercise (courtesy of the iGEM British Columbia 2011 community brick activity). Students reported an increase in understanding and appreciation for synthetic biology following the event, and they also said that it was a lot of fun!

The Science behind "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks"

Freshmen at Missouri S&T that are enrolled in their basic English course participate in the “One Book Program”. In this program, all of these English courses are dedicated to the study and interpretation of a single piece of modern literature. For the past two years, the book studied has been The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. The novel details the story of Henrietta Lacks, the unknowing tissue donor that led to the famous HeLa cell line that has become a staple in biological labs across the world. But despite the fame of her cells, little is known about Ms. Lacks or the ethical, racial, and economical implications of her story. This narrative is explored as Ms. Skloot’s account of family interviews and paper trails is weaved together into a fascinating story.

The Missouri S&T iGEM Team saw this as a prime opportunity to reach out to the new students on campus. While the book describes the story of Henrietta Lacks and the impact of her cells on her family and the medical research community, not much is explained about the research or how it is conducted. Our team collaborated with the English and Technical Communication department to put together a seminar that describes how biological research is performed and how it can be applied. We also gave students a chance to experience biology hands-on by showing them how to extract DNA from wheat germ. At the end, students were entered to win cancer cell plush toys! Overall, this event helped to reach out to the new student body while also educating students about the applications of biological research.

Biological Sciences Open Lab

Each semester the social group, Helix, in the Missouri S&T Department of Biological Sciences hosts an Open Lab where all of the biology research labs in the department gather to explain their research to interested students. iGEM has commonly participated in this event to reach out to biology students interested in a student-run research group.

Celebration of Nations

The Missouri S&T Division of International Affairs hosts the Celebration of Nations every year in the Rolla, Missouri community. The event consists of a parade through the downtown of Rolla that showcases the nationalities of students on the campus and ends with a fair full of international crafts, foods, games, and performances. As the iGEM foundation consists of teams around the globe, the Missouri S&T iGEM team participates with other student organizations by marching in the parade. This is one of the first large campus events of the fall semester, thus our team uses this event to not only show our Missouri S&T pride but also to get new members involved in a simple and fun team event.

Speak Up Speak Out

iGEM hosted a seminar that was part of the Speak Up, Speak Out series by the Cultural and Leadership Programs on the Missouri S&T campus. At these events, students are invited to engage in facilitated discussions about controversial topics. For our event, we discussed the ethics of genetic engineering, genetically modified organisms, and the applications of synthetic biology with interested students. This was a great learning opportunity for students involved and many reported a better understanding of synthetic biology after the event. It also allowed our team to gauge campus attitudes and misconceptions about genetic engineering, and it gave us a guide for how to approach future educational events.

Waynesville High School STEM Expo

Waynesville, Missouri is a rural town about fourty-five minutes away from Rolla that has put together a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) exposition for its high school students. The Student Design and Experiential Learning Center (SDELC) sends team representatives to this event to talk about their experiences as a design team member at Missouri S&T and to display their projects for interested high school students. Our team has participated in this event as a way to interest young minds in the biological sciences.

Engineers’ Week at St. Louis Science Center

The SDELC also sends design team representatives to the St. Louis Science Center each year during the center’s Engineers’ Week. For iGEM, we bring information about our project to teach young children that are visiting the center about synthetic biology. We also show them colored or glowing bacteria to teach them about gene expression.

Missouri S&T Homecoming Weekend

The SDELC is highly involved in alumni events in order to encourage Missouri S&T alumni to get involved in the student design teams. As one of the SDLEC’s newest design teams and also as the only biological sciences design team, alumni have been very excited to learn about our team. On the Friday of Homecoming weekend, which is held in mid-October each year, the alumni are treated to the Silver & Gold Reception, where they can mingle with other alumni and interact with the design teams. At this event, our team has brought our project information to share with alumni and tell them how to get involved with our team. The next day, the SDELC hosts an Open House for alumni who have contributed to SDELC fundraising efforts. Our team has attended this event to build awareness about our team to the alumni of our school and this year we showed them the plans for our new lab that will be built in the center.

Campus Recruitment and Outreach Events

To help grow our organization’s presence on campus, we have attended new student organizational resource fairs and we have given talks in introductory and mid-level biological science classes. It is because of these campus recruitment efforts that we have grown as a team and have established ourselves as active participants in the S&T student community.