Team:HBUT-China

HBUT iGEM 2018

Wuhan China





About US

This year's iGEM team decided to continue the work started by last year's team with the Nickel Hunter project; a biological device to detect nickel ions in the environment. Two shortcomings of the previous design were a small measurement range, and low precision. This year we added the nickel ions channel protein NikABCDE gene to the original gene element allowing the ions to enter the cell more smoothly, which has improved both of these issues. We also replaced the RFP gene with the luciferase LuxCDABE gene. The reporter gene emits bioluminescence in response to nickel ions which further enhances our measurement precision. It also provided the opportunity to develop a biosensing instrument for real-time nickel ions detection. Our changes improved sensitivity and range, as well as provided an opportunity for a new method of nickel ions detection.