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Policy & Practices
Content
2. Poster Session at the University of Tokyo
3. Interview with the Science Magazine Newton
6. The Genetics Society of Japan
| We participated in a poster session held at the University of Tokyo on May 18th. iGEM teams from all over Japan | |
gathered at this event and introduced their project to the visitors. Not only students and professors at the university, but also people without any scientific background came and listened to our projects. After introducing our projects, we asked visitors for feedbacks to make our projects better. Our central purpose in this event was to let people know what iGEM is, and change the negative thinking about synthetic biology that many people have. |
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Fig. 6-1-1. A team member describing the project to visitors |
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The Projects
To introduce our projects to the visitors, we made a poster for each project. Using figures, we tried our best to make it easy for people from any background to understand. Besides posters for our projects, we also made an introduction to iGEM to let more people know about it.
The five projects that we introduced at the poster session were: solar battery, treatment for pollen allergy, lie detector, Bank E. coli, and fertilizer.
| • Solar Battery | |
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Solar energy is one of the alternative sources of energy widely used in the world. In this project, we made a solar battery by using photosynthetic bacteria and current generating bacteria to generate power. Wherever sunlight shines, electricity can be generated by this solar battery. It was invented and improved in several institutes, but the low efficiency and inconvenient hardware still tend to be a problem. Therefore, we tried to improve the efficiency of the existing bacteria-using solar battery to make it practical. |
Fig. 6-1-2. Bacteria-using Solar Battery Poster |
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| • Treatment for Pollen Allergy | |
In Japan, it is said that one in five people suffers from pollen allergy. More than twenty million people suffer from symptoms, and the number is increasing every year. In order to cure this, we thought of using E. coli in immunotherapy. Immunotherapy is a recently developed treatment that can completely cure the allergy. You introduce allergen into the body in very small amounts, and by gradually increasing it, you can suppress the body′s hyper-allergic reaction. However, there are several defects in this treatment. You have to go to the hospital for treatment many times, and it takes three to five years for a complete recovery. By using E. coli, we tried to invent a faster and easier immunotherapy. |
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Fig. 6-1-3. Immunotherapy Poster |
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| • Lie Detector | |
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In this project, we tried to make a lie detector by using E. coli. By putting Na+ channel in the flagellum motor, E. coli responds to the sodium ion contained in a liar′s sweat and starts running. If the E. coli moves, it comes in contact with lysozyme and the outer membrane dissolves. Then, ATP inside the E. coli is released to react with luciferase, producing a glow. |
Fig. 6-1-4. Lie Detector Poster |
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| • Bank E.coli | |
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We thought of making E. coli act as a bank by taking things in and out. We had two scenarios for this theme: • Exchanging things between Bank E. coli and Consumer E. coli • Making deposits and withdraws by a group of Bank E. coli Other than these stories, recreating the bursting of the bubble economy with E. coli was also in the plan. |
Fig. 6-1-5. Bank E. coli Poster |
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| • Fertilizer | |
Micronutrient fertilizer is very important to the growth of crops. However, more than 70% of the fertilizer goes unused in soil. Phosphorus included in the fertilizer becomes insoluble by binding with metals, such as aluminum and calcium. Since plants cannot absorb these immobilized phosphorus, the phosphorus accumulates in the soil. To solve this problem, we decided to use E. coli to degrade the immobilized phosphorus into phosphoric acid, which plants can absorb. After producing phosphoric acid, E. coli stores it in its body in a polymeric form. By collecting these E. coli and extracting the polymer, we can retrieve the phosphorus left in the soil. |
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Fig. 6-1-6. Fertilizer Poster |
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Results
After introducing what iGEM is and our projects to the visitors, they gave us many advices and opinions. We prepared blue and yellow blank Post-it notes, and asked them to write down their opinions. Expressions of agreement or support were written on the yellow Post-it notes, while critical points or suggestions were written on the blue Post-it notes. We reflected the feedback and comments from the visitors to make our projects better (The comments that visitors gave for each project are listed in Table 1). We thank all the visitors for cooperating us in this poster session. |
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Many visitors, especially people without any scientific background, had negative thinking of E. coli at first. However, by introducing the properties of E. coli, they changed their mind. On the Post-it, there were many opinions saying that they were looking forward to new inventions using E. coli. We can say that our goal, which is letting people know and changing the negative thinking of synthetic biology, has been achieved. |
Fig. 6-1-7. Our members discussing about the project with the visitor. Post-it with comments are stuck on the board |
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3.Interview with the Science Magazine Newton
On June 17th, we had an interview on graphic science magazine Newton. Newton is one of the most popular science magazine born in Japan. Although it is a scientific book, easy contents and catchy photos are used, so it has been read by many people regardless of age and sex. In the article, the history and requirements of iGEM, as well as what our team has done in preparing for the Jamboree were written. The article is shown below.
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| Fig. 6-1-8. Picture of the Newton article | Fig. 6-1-9. Group photo of our team in the article |
Reference
Yasashiku Wakaru Seimei no Kagaku [Easily Understandable Life Science]. (Newton supplement Mook) Tokyo: Newton Press, 2014
4.Muse Talk
On September 1st, we gave a presentation at a workshop called “MUSE TALK”. Managers, executives and technicians working in IT company participated in this event to learn about things outside their specialty. The contents of the presentation are listed below.
• What is iGEM?
• The trend in synthetic biology (The trend in iGEM 2013)
• The project of Team Tokyo_Tech 2013
• The development of technique that supports iGEM
(BioBrick, database related to synthetic biology, MATLAB, etc.)
• Introduction of Team Tokyo_Tech
• What Team Tokyo_Tech 2014 has been doing since the new team was organized
In the presentation, we used many pictures and figures in the slide to make it easier to image synthetic biology, which is a completely new field for them.
After the presentation, we were able to get opinions from the audience. Hearing from people working in a different field was a great opportunity for us. Some people gave us ideas of a new product which we never thought of. Also, there were people who asked questions related to safety. All the people with those questions had things in common; they all thought it would be a big business chance if genetically engineered E. coli can be released safely in human and nature.
By listening to our presentation, many audience were impressed with the technology of synthetic biology, and acknowledged it as a research which estimates future prospects. We are planning to present in this workshop again after this year’s Jamboree, so we will be glad if more people from a variety of fields come to attend. In the next presentation, we are planning to introduce the trends in iGEM2014.
We attended The 86th Annual Meeting of the Genetics Society of Japan. Nagahama hosted this meeting, and 8 teams (HokkaidoU japan, UT-Tokyo, Tokyo-Tech, TMU-Tokyo, Gifu, Kyoto, Osaka) attended. We had three things. |
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1.) Exchange of opinion with other teams beside poster |
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2.) Presentation behind scholar |
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3.) Discussion about iGEM JAPAN |
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Fig. 6-1 Poster of The 86th Annual Meeting of the Genetics Society of Japan |
Fig. 6-2 Our member made a presentation behind scholars. |
| Discussion about Project | |
| In this part, each team will present their projects form this year or last year by use the poster session. | |
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Fig. 6-3 Our team poster |
Fig. 6-4 iGEM Japan teams |
| Discussion about iGEM JAPAN | |
We have talked about what we can do and what we should do for the future of iGEM JAPAN. iGEM JAPAN is the community of iGEM teams from all over Japan. Unfortunately, recently the comunity activities has drop because of the cost of money and time. So nowadays only the capital university will attend most of the activities. For now, we plan to make a homepage to keep contact and give latest news about compettition and activities with every university. |
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Fig. 6-5 Group photo after presentation |
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