Team:INSA-Lyon/Perception

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Curly'on - IGEM 2014 INSA-LYON

This Human Practice section aims at explaining the synthetic biology field as a compromise between science and society.
Our approach includes an international survey aiming at understanding the perception of synthetic biology and the impact of our biotechnology project by the public opinion. We insist on the historical approach of biology in Lyon (France) because it's an example of how population and scientists co-build science, technology, health and environment within a society.


  • Rising awareness


We also wanted to determine if the profile was related to geographic localisation and hence, culture. Here are the proportions, in percents, of people from each country in each cluster :
cluster Informed and favorable Informed and unfavorable Not informed and favorable A little informed and unfavorable A little informed and favorable
France 22 31 14 10 23
USA 75 0 0 0 25
China 18.4 22.5 14.2 26.5 18.4
Slovakia 14.3 0 14.3 42.8 28.6
French Polynesia 23.5 16.5 15.3 25.9 18.8

We can see that the global distributions are the same for the countries in the cluster, except for the USA, but that is because we didn't get much data from there. We conclude that knowledge about synthetic biology is not geography dependent, which is probably because it is a really recent field of science that manage to diffuse everywhere at the same pace.

Spreading the word

Gladly, our message was heard loud and clear. After finding the general opinion about synthetic biology in a scientific environment, the next step was to raise awareness to the not specialized audience. Several publications in the newspaper or at the television gave voice to our project. Our initiative was appreciated and at the same time enabled us to share the amazing, infinite possibilities that the synthetic biology can offer.

Some of the internet and newspapers articles:

les filles au labo

Also, the members of the team are actively involved in INSA ADN Concept Club, an association that supports this initiative with its newsletter and many other activities.

  • CurLy'on for dummies


  • Walk in the Lyon Biopole