Team:Auckland New Zealand/Project

From 2014.igem.org

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<p>Tell us more about your project.  Give us background.  Use this as the abstract of your project.  Be descriptive but concise (1-2 paragraphs) </p>
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<p> With the increase of antibiotic resistance in pathogenic microorganisms, the management of cutaneous injuries with traditional methods (such as bandaging and antibiotic application) has become less effective. This project will introduce the concept of selective colonization of the wound site by an engineered microorganism to prevent subsequent infection by pathogens. </p>
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<h3>References </h3>
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<p>Numerous studies have  suggested probiotic skin flora utilize various mechanisms to inhibit pathogenic infection, such as competition to binding sites, nutrients, production of inhibitory bacteriocins and organic acids that kill or inhibit growth of  the pathogens. We aim to engineer a bacterial strain which, when applied to a wound site, will prevent the infection of the wound, such as by ''Staphylococcus aureus'', a common skin pathogen.
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To achieve this the engineered bacterial strain will incorporate the following components:
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iGEM teams are encouraged to record references you use during the course of your research. They should be posted somewhere on your wiki so that judges and other visitors can see how you though about your project and what works inspired you. </p>  
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(1) Regulatory control - It must have mechanisms which will restrict the growth and survival of the engineered microbe to designated sites and avoid unwanted spread. This is achieved by a suicide switch which is regulated by the presence/absence of signal substances.
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(2)Biological Protection - It will have mechanisms which will inhibit the growth of other exogenous microorganisms. This will be achieved by blocking the binding sites on the wound as well as spatial exclusion of the exogenous bacteria to the wound site.
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<p> You can use these subtopics to further explain your project</p>
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(3) Mechanical Protection - It will incorporate mechanisms which will protect the wound from further physical damage as well as from other factors such as dessication. Biofilm formation is being investigated as to whether it will suit this purpose.
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(4)It will contain mechanisms which assists in wound healing. Such mechanisms could be factors which induce keratinocyte proliferation or factors which reduces/stop bleeding.
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<td > <h3> Project Details </h3></td>
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We will focus on the Biological Protection aspect of Bac-Barrier in the 2014 iGEM project. Instead of the usual methods of devising mechanisms to secrete antimicrobial substances to kill of incoming pathogens, we have chosen to approach this in a rather unorthodox method - We will devise mechanisms which prevent the pathogenic bacteria reaching the wound, instead of killing them outright. The reasoning for this is that within a species of pathogenic bacteria, there will be natural variation in the susceptibility to antimicrobial substances. The usage of antibiotics will facilitate the selection of resistant strains, rendering the long term usage ineffective.
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<li>Overall project summary</li>
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<li>'''Project Overview'''</li>
<li>Project Details</li>
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<li>Conclusions</li>
<li>Conclusions</li>
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<h3>References </h3>
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iGEM teams are encouraged to record references you use during the course of your research. They should be posted somewhere on your wiki so that judges and other visitors can see how you though about your project and what works inspired you. </p>
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<p> You can use these subtopics to further explain your project</p>
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Revision as of 23:20, 13 October 2014



Home Team Official Team Profile Project Parts Modeling Notebook Safety Attributions

Bac-Barrier (Name subject to change)

Overview

With the increase of antibiotic resistance in pathogenic microorganisms, the management of cutaneous injuries with traditional methods (such as bandaging and antibiotic application) has become less effective. This project will introduce the concept of selective colonization of the wound site by an engineered microorganism to prevent subsequent infection by pathogens.


Project Overview

Numerous studies have suggested probiotic skin flora utilize various mechanisms to inhibit pathogenic infection, such as competition to binding sites, nutrients, production of inhibitory bacteriocins and organic acids that kill or inhibit growth of the pathogens. We aim to engineer a bacterial strain which, when applied to a wound site, will prevent the infection of the wound, such as by ''Staphylococcus aureus'', a common skin pathogen. To achieve this the engineered bacterial strain will incorporate the following components:

(1) Regulatory control - It must have mechanisms which will restrict the growth and survival of the engineered microbe to designated sites and avoid unwanted spread. This is achieved by a suicide switch which is regulated by the presence/absence of signal substances.

(2)Biological Protection - It will have mechanisms which will inhibit the growth of other exogenous microorganisms. This will be achieved by blocking the binding sites on the wound as well as spatial exclusion of the exogenous bacteria to the wound site.

(3) Mechanical Protection - It will incorporate mechanisms which will protect the wound from further physical damage as well as from other factors such as dessication. Biofilm formation is being investigated as to whether it will suit this purpose.

(4)It will contain mechanisms which assists in wound healing. Such mechanisms could be factors which induce keratinocyte proliferation or factors which reduces/stop bleeding.

Project Details

We will focus on the Biological Protection aspect of Bac-Barrier in the 2014 iGEM project. Instead of the usual methods of devising mechanisms to secrete antimicrobial substances to kill of incoming pathogens, we have chosen to approach this in a rather unorthodox method - We will devise mechanisms which prevent the pathogenic bacteria reaching the wound, instead of killing them outright. The reasoning for this is that within a species of pathogenic bacteria, there will be natural variation in the susceptibility to antimicrobial substances. The usage of antibiotics will facilitate the selection of resistant strains, rendering the long term usage ineffective.

  1. '''Project Overview'''
  2. Project Details
  3. Materials and Methods
  4. The Experiments
  5. Results
  6. Data analysis
  7. Conclusions

References

iGEM teams are encouraged to record references you use during the course of your research. They should be posted somewhere on your wiki so that judges and other visitors can see how you though about your project and what works inspired you.

You can use these subtopics to further explain your project

It's important for teams to describe all the creativity that goes into an iGEM project, along with all the great ideas your team will come up with over the course of your work.

It's also important to clearly describe your achievements so that judges will know what you tried to do and where you succeeded. Please write your project page such that what you achieved is easy to distinguish from what you attempted.

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