Team:Exeter/Human Practices
'Human Practices' are methods of investigating and predicting the way a project will influence society and the world in order to produce the best possible outcomes. Closely tied with Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI), it encourages teams to talk with stakeholders and the public in order to inform and shape their project for the better. This is especially important for iGEM, where it encourages discourse between scientists and those affected by their inventions.
Synthetic biology is a field which has the potential to be controversial amongst the general public due to its ability to massively change the world as we know it. Though great things can be achieved through it, there’s also the possibility of negative impacts. By discussing openly with the public about their concerns and creating a two-way diologue, there is the opportunity to address them, creating a more positive view of the field. This isn’t only true for synthetic biology, as advances have been made in numerous fields, making way for the possibility of catastrophic effects. The skills obtained through investigating human practices in iGEM can be transferred to any subject, enabling advances in communication between all scientists and the public. Considering the implications of a project throughout its development also decreases the likelihood and severity of unforeseen effects as they are constantly being predicted. Human Practices weighs up and considers the benefits and the severity of potential impacts, and the design is appropriately adapted.
After carefully considering different frameworks, we found one which we thought addressed all the needs of humans practices above: ELSA. This paradigm addresses the Ethical, Legal and Social Aspects of a project, and we thought these the most relevant to our topic. We investigated each of these three aspects by interviewing experts from a variety of pertinent areas, in addition to our own research and analysis. You can read more about our application of ELSA for the silver medal criteria here.
While looking at our project through the lens of ELSA, one part of our project kept coming up: our bioreactor design. We decided to dedicate particular focus on this, first integrating advice and particularities that we got from interviewed experts, then actively finding solutions to the issues raised. In order to clearly show how stakeholders influenced our design over time for the gold medal criteria, we’ve created a timeline.