Team:LMU-Munich/Human Practice/Meetups

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iGEM meets CASLMU

1st Meetup of the German iGEM Teams

Regional jamborees or the annual congress of Initiative Biotechnology 2020+ have always been perfect networking platforms for iGEM teams. As neither of these events took place this year, we decided to host our own meeting. Encouraged by the Center for Advanced Studies of the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität Munich (CASLMU), our team organized the meetup on the weekend before a CASLMU-based workshop focusing on Synthetic Biology. We invited members of all German iGEM teams to spend the weekend from Saturday to Monday (May 24-26) in Munich. Fortunately, members of 11 teams and in total about 70 people could attend the event.

The first day at the Biocenter was predominately intended to get to know each other and to listen to the inspiring keynote talks by Prof. Dr. Friedrich Simmel (TU Munich) and Prof. Dr. Thorsten Mascher (LMU Munich). The speakers introduced the concepts of Synthetic Biology and gave insight into their current projects. The talks were followed by a cosy get-together with barbecue until the late evening. On Sunday, each team had the chance to present their innovative project ideas to the other teams and discuss it. In the afternoon, team members could attend workshops in which the subgroups talked about biosafety, bioethics and a Germany-wide SynBio Day. Later on, we enjoyed the nice weather by spending the evening in a beergarden with typical Bavarian flair. On the last day, our guests had the opportunity to stroll around Munich’s inner city or even take a short guided sightseeing tour, before attending the workshop at the CASLMU covering Synthetic Biological Tools for Single Cell Analysis. Besides talks by Erez Braun (Haifa) and Roland Wedlich-Söldner (Münster), almost all iGEM teams introduced their project ideas and received further feedback from the audience.

All in all, the meetup was a great opportunity to get to know young, aspiring researchers, to learn about each other’s projects, and also network to develop policy & practices ideas or possibly even bundle projects together. We thank the CASLMU and our other sponsors for enabling this event and of course all participants for making it such a great success.


For more information, pictures and videos check out our Meetup Wiki: https://2014.igem.org/Meetups/May_LMU-Munich

Find here more articles about our meetup:

http://www.bio-m.org/news/bio-hacker-unter-sich.html

http://www.laborjournal.de/editorials/844.lasso

Aachen Meetup

We also participated in the Aachen Meetup with three of our team members. Although we had the misfortune of driving 700 km of highway on the last school holiday in some parts of Germany, we finally arrived in the wonderful town of Aachen on Friday night after a ten hour drive and checked in at our cozy [http://www.hostel-aachen.de/ Hostel]. Since we were really excited about the program that Team Aachen organized, we only had a small walk around the historic city center and made our first culinary experiences before going to bed early in order to be prepared for the Meetup. The program started in the afternoon, and was a warm-hearted welcome by Team Aachen and a reunion of team members who already got to know each other at the Munich Meetup (which was awesome too). To calm down the excitement, Aachen organized a funny game of Jeopardy, building the perfect platform for Team Darmstadt to entertain the rest. We did our best, but were bested by Team Tübingen and their shadowy mastermind. In the evening, we had the chance to publicly present our project to a great crowd. But this was just the start for a joyful night to follow. After a few rounds of drinks organized by team Aachen, we went to the world famous Pontstraße, the place in Aachen that never sleeps... Rumour has it that a certain team had so much fun that they could not show up on the next day. On Sunday, guest speakers held lectures and the teams had the chance to present their project once more in greater detail to each other. It was nice and inspiring to see how the other teams that we don't regard as competitors anymore but as dear friends had progressed during the past months. Unfortunately this already concluded the Meetup and after a short side track to buy some [http://www.aachen.de Printen] we were already back again on the road to Munich, leaving Aachen with a crying and a smiling eye, due to the great experience we had.

Hi there!

Welcome to our Wiki! I'm BaKillus, the pathogen-hunting microbe, and I'll guide you on this tour through our project. If you want to learn more about a specific step, you can simply close the tour and come back to it anytime you like. So let's start!

What's the problem?

First of all, what am I doing here? The problem is, pathogenic bacteria all around the world are becoming more and more resistant against antimicrobial drugs. One major reason for the trend is the inappropriate use of drugs. With my BaKillus super powers, I want to reduce this misuse and thus do my part to save global health.

Sensing of pathogens

To combat the pathogenic bacteria, I simply eavesdrop on their communication. Bacteria talk with each other via quorum sensing systems, which I use to detect them and trigger my responses.

Adhesion

The more specific and effective I can use my powers, the lower the danger is of provoking new resistance development. So I catch pathogens whenever I get hold of them and stick to them until my work is done.

Killing

Talking about my work - killing pathogens is finally what I am made for. In response to quorum sensing molecules of the pathogens, I export a range of antimicrobial substances leading to dissipation of biofilms and the killing of the targeted bacteria.

Suicide switch

When the job is done and all the bad guys are finished, you don't need a super hero anymore. So after fulfilling my work I say goodbye to the world by activating my suicide switch.

Application

Of course I'm not only a fictional hero, but a very real one. In two different prototypes, I could be used for diagnosis or treatment of pathogen-caused diseases. However, there is still a whole lot of regulational and economical questions that have to be answered before.

See you!

So now you know my short story - and it is time for me to return to my fight for a safer world. Feel free to take a closer look on my super powers, the process of my development or the plans for a medical application.

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