Team:Paris Bettencourt/Citizen Science

From 2014.igem.org

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<td><b>BACKGROUND</b></br><br>
<td><b>BACKGROUND</b></br><br>
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<p class=text1> Although an iGEM competition for High Schools exists, there is low involvement around the world. We are aware that many students would be interested in participating but do not know that the competition exists or are not sure about how to start an iGEM team. </p></td>
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<p class=text1> Body odor is a unique characteristic of each individual. Our body aroma is extremely complex and previous studies showed that this odor is influenced by many parameters. We choose an ci</p></td>
<td><b>AIMS</b></br><br>
<td><b>AIMS</b></br><br>
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<p class=text1><ul style="list-style-type:square">
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   <li>Create a MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) to help High School students build a team</li>
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   <li>Getting Citizen Scientists involved: by giving samples or by analyzing others samples</li>
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   <li>Encourage students and teachers to use the tool 'Education Genius' that combines videos and commented texts.
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   <li>Development of an online platform to analyse the data
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   <li>Meet different High Schools around the world to promote both tools.</li>
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   <li>Collect samples and analysis from a wide range of volunteers</li>
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<td><b>RESULTS</b></br><br>
<td><b>RESULTS</b></br><br>
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<p class=text1><ul style="list-style-type:square"><li>More than 600 participations
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Revision as of 14:19, 16 October 2014

BACKGROUND

Body odor is a unique characteristic of each individual. Our body aroma is extremely complex and previous studies showed that this odor is influenced by many parameters. We choose an ci

AIMS

  • Getting Citizen Scientists involved: by giving samples or by analyzing others samples
  • Development of an online platform to analyse the data
  • Collect samples and analysis from a wide range of volunteers
.

RESULTS

  • More than 600 participations

Introduction Aims Results Achievements

Introduction

Body odor is a unique characteristic of each individual. Our body aroma is extremely complex and previous studies showed that this odor is influenced by many parameters, including lifestyle, diet, gender and age.

However, the relationship between these parameters and the body odor remain unclear. To assess this relationship, we chose a crowdsourcing approach, which has been shown to be successful in the past (ref: foldit) for big data scientific studies.

In this process, the general public can participate both by giving data and analyzing it. While helping us with the project, they learn about their own odor and Synthetic Biology.

Aims

- Getting Citizen Scientists involved: The general public can be involved by either giving samples and/or by analyzing them through an online game called “The Smell Game”.

- Collecting and analyzing armpit smell samples: The volunteers placed cotton pads under their armpits for a specified amount of time and filled a form with information about their lifestyle, diet, gender and age.

- Developing an online game to analyze the samples and learn more about the microbiome: The participants use our online platform to analyze samples that have been given by other participants. People will assess their personal impression of the fragrance of the different samples. The final aim is to give users the analysis of their personal odor provided by others participants.

- Study how emotions can affect body odor: Taking samples of volunteers before and after watching a horror movie and making a smell test to determine if there is a significant change in their body odor.


Figure X: The horror movie experiment. We collected samples of 17 volunteers before and after watching a scary movie. Differences in strength and pleasantness were not found significant overall (Wilcoxon test, difference in strength p=0.69; difference in pleasantness p=0.84) although some individuals did experience a significant change (volunteers number 3 and 9). Samples were tested by at least 4 people.

Results

1. Blablabla
Text

2. Tururu
Text

3. Horror movie night experiment
We collected samples of 17 donors before and after watching a scary movie. After, both samples were rated in a scale from 0 to 5 in strength and pleasantness. At least 4 people analyzed every sample. The difference between the after and before tube was plotted for every individual (Fig. X). After statistical analysis, we found no significant increase in strength and decrease in pleasantness in the participant's body odor after watching the movie (Wilcoxon test, difference in strength p=0.69; difference in pleasantness p=0.84). Although some individuals did experiment a significant change.

Achievements

Overall, more than 600 participants from all around the world collaborated with us (France, Poland, Colombia, Israel, UK). They were aged from 5 to 65 years old.

We hosted several smell events where Citizen Scientists were able to learn about our project and participate in it. One of the events took place at the 'Cité des Sciences' (a known Science Museum in Paris) called “Parfums Microbiens”. During three days, we held up a stand that included posters explaining the relationship between the microbiome and body odor, a place to analyze sweat samples using our 'Smell Game' software and an area to exercise playing a 'Wii' game and donate sweat samples. During this event, we collected around a hundred samples and analysis of smells.

Centre for Research and Interdisciplinarity (CRI)
Faculty of Medicine Cochin Port-Royal, South wing, 2nd floor
Paris Descartes University
24, rue du Faubourg Saint Jacques
75014 Paris, France
+33 1 44 41 25 22/25
paris-bettencourt-igem@googlegroups.com
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