Team:GES NCSU Raleigh NC/Notebook

From 2014.igem.org

North Carolina State University Genetic Engineering & Society Center iGEM Team

We are working with Antony Evans of the Glowing Plant Project to explore what it means to act responsibly with respect to genetic engineering. Specifically, we propose an iterative concept mapping framework to assess the values that people associate with responsibly releasing genetically engineered plants beyond the laboratory.

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Notebook

May 7, 2014

First meeting to garner interest and discuss potential projects. We discussed the rule and timeline of the iGEM project. The consensus is that we will enter the Policy and Practices track. We decided to focus on the Glowing Plant – possibly by producing a risk assessment.

May 22, 2014

We formed three main working groups: 1) Risk Assessment (Jayce, Rene, Sophia, Jen, Ronnie, and Johanna), 2) Policy Brief (Jayce and Emily), 3) Public Opinion Engagement (Emily, Sophia, Rene, Ronnie, and Elizabeth). Then we set our next steps
1. collectively create outline
2. Discuss modeling techniques including systems mapping, concept mapping, mind mapping, influence diagrams, bazenet, and decision trees
3. Individuals need to register for the team on the iGEM website
a. team name is GES_NCSU_Raleigh_NC
b. Use the registration code given to register
Finally, we discussed individual team member interests and developed a list of questions to ask Antony Evans during our Skype conversation.

May 22, 2014

Skype conversation with team and Antony Evans.

May 28, 2014

Meeting with Antony Evans, Elizabeth Pitts, Sheron King, and Jennifer Kuzma, Andrew Maynard, and Tina Ndoh at the GET conference in Arizona to further flesh out details about our project plan. This meeting provided critical perspective from the entrepreneurial world/DIY world.

June 5, 2014

We created a timeline of deadlines for our project and were briefed on the meeting with Antony Evans that took place in Arizona. We also brainstormed a rough outline of our “choose your own adventure” risk assessment/concept map/document and divided up sections for smaller groups to work on more thoroughly.

July 1, 2014

Rough drafts of individual sections turned in on Google Drive. Team members should edit drafts online before group meeting on July 7, 2014.

July 7, 2014

Briefing from Elizabeth on her travels and interactions with the DIY Biology movement in Europe. Discussion about various sections, the idea for the document is continuously evolving. It was decided that everyone should revise their documents based on the discussion and online comments from other members. The revised drafts should be submitted by Monday, July 14. We need to develop a visual model, so we will have an additional meeting on Friday, July 11 to discuss ideas for developing a visual model (mind map vs. concept map). We need to find a person to shoot our 3 minute video.

July 11, 2014

Brainstorming web design and video presentation ideas. Jayce Sudweeks provided us with a presentation comparing mind maps and concepts maps. He showed us some software that we can use to create our final product. For the video Sophia, Emily, and Ronnie will work together to organize production of the video. Elizabeth will take the lead on writing the two-page executive summary. Our next group meeting won’t be until Tuesday, August 19 since Jen, Jayce, Ronnie, and Johanna are travelling out of the country for class. At the next meeting we will follow up to discuss any remaining loose ends.

August 4th

Barry joined the group to act as webmaster and started working on the website in order to make it less intimidating to the rest of the team. He created a template space within the group's namespace so that we can store templates that will be included in many places, leaving the content pages for the rest of the team.

August 7, 2014

Sophia, Emily, Brad (videographer), Elizabeth, David Berube, and Jennifer Kuzma met to discuss producing the required 3-minute video. Deadlines for video production were set. Filming will be on September 9. There was also more discussion on the ever-evolving concept map/final document that we will produce.

August 11, 2014

The team received feedback on written sections from Jennifer Kuzma.

August 19, 2014

First group meeting since several members returned from study abroad course. We received an update from Emily and Sophia about the progress of the video. We reviewed the draft concept map that Johanna produced. We discussed jamboree attendance. Since the attendance fee is so expensive and we already paid a large fee for the team to participate we will not be able to take everyone to Boston. We have enough money to send 5 or 6 team members only. Finally, we created a “To Do” list to help everyone stay on track as the new semester begins.

August 26, 2014

We reviewed Johanna’s draft concept map, timeline, and list of “parking lot” ideas. We reviewed Elizabeth’s draft theoretical framework. Jennifer Kuzma conducted a systems mapping exercise with the group to build upon Johanna’s draft. We reviewed the tasks and deadlines from the To Do list. We finalized the list of Jamboree attendees. They will be Elizabeth, Emily, Jen Baltzegar, Barry, Rene, and Johanna. Scripts for the video are due August 29. We will have a video review meeting on September 25 to provide comments and ask for revisions from Brad. Brad will send final video by October 1. We ended the meeting with a long discussion about tweaking the tool to be more general than just for the Glowing Plant and incorporating an algorithm into it to make it more quantitative than qualitative. We divided up sections and will have a draft concept map due by the next meeting based on our previous group writings.

September 8, 2014

We discussed logistics about filming on September 9. We reviewed several software packages that could allow us to create the document that we have envisioned, however none have exactly the capability that we want. We may have to make do with a combination of one of the packages and an excel spreadsheet or database form. Our next step is to develop an explanation of how the tool will work for users. We need to include an explanation of what it is, how it works, the rationale behind it, and finally use the glowing plant as an example. We also need to compile the maps into a single document, Jayce will take the lead on this. Finally, we updated the To Do list and planned our next meeting.

September 11, 2014

Phone call with Andrew Maynard, Antony Evans, Elizabeth Pitts, and Jennifer Kuzma to discuss progress of our project and get some advice and guidance for finishing up the tool that we are creating.

September 16, 2014

Tool development team meeting. We met to discuss in more detail how we want the tool to look and function. Elizabeth brought comments from the faculty advisors for us to consider. We looked at Jayce's initial c-map online and discussed the limitations of the software. And we planned our next steps.

September 25, 2014

Elizabeth held a phone conference with Andrew Maynard to get comments and suggestions about updated tool and c-map.
Whole group meeting. We reviewed the first draft of our 3-minute video. We looked at the most recent version of the concept map and divided up responsibilities for updating it. Rene updated us on the evaluation tool, which will act as a "rough draft" while Barry perfects the online version. Elizabeth shared feedback from phone conversation with Andrew Maynard. Jen B. updated team on wiki progress. We planned the next group meeting and set goals to be accomplished by then.

October 9, 2014

We met as a group to discuss last minute edits and logistics for finalizing project details. We set deadlines to finish populating the concept map and wiki updates. We approved the final version of the 3-minute video and discussed plans and logistics for the Giant Jamboree.