1. Team Requirements

Below are the 2018 team requirements for participating in the iGEM Competition. If you have any questions about these requirements, please email us at hq AT igem DOT org.

1.1 Team Composition and Team Roster

iGEM teams consist primarily of undergraduate students at an accredited college or university. Teams may also be composed of postgraduate students, high school students, or community lab members.

Each team has a Team Roster that must be completed by the Team Roster Freeze. The Team Roster must include everyone who is involved with the iGEM team, including professors, teachers, instructors, advisors, and the student team members. The Team Roster should be filled out as early as possible. This can be an ongoing process as some team members and advisors are added or removed, but it should be filled in to the best of your ability on the same day that you register your team.

Why is the Team Roster Important?
The Team Roster:

1. determines the Team Section (see Section 1.4) for collegiate and community lab Team Kinds (see Section 1.2)
2. gives iGEM HQ information about the number of participants for the 2018 season
3. gives iGEM HQ the contact information for the entire team
4. is used to determine who will receive iGEM participation certificates at the Giant Jamboree

1.2 Team Kind

In iGEM 2018, teams will register as one of three team "kinds", and each kind will have different team role requirements for the "Primary and Secondary PI" role (see Section 1.3). The rest of the roles are the same throughout the team kinds. The three team kinds are:

• Collegiate: Teams consist primarily of collegiate students. You may also have postgraduate students and/or high school students on the team.
• High School: Teams consist of only high school students and students who will graduate high school in 2018. High School teams compete with other High School teams in the High School Track and Section.
• Please see Section 1.3 below for the definition of the Primary and Secondary PI for High School Requirements.
• Community Lab: Teams consist of members of a community lab. This can include anyone. Community Lab teams compete with Collegiate teams in the Traditional and Special Tracks and in the Undergraduate and Overgraduate Sections based on the team members' ages.
• Please see Section 1.3 below for the definition of the Primary and Secondary PI for Community Lab Requirements

1.3 Team Roles

Similar to sports teams, team members have different roles and responsibilities on a team:

• Students = Team player. Responsible for brainstorming, choosing, and executing project idea; students are also responsible for documenting their work and for meeting the various iGEM deadlines throughout the iGEM season (see 2018 Calendar and 2018 Major Deadlines for details).


• Primary and Secondary PI = General manager. Individuals in a position of authority (ex: in a university setting, he/she is authorized to have lab space, grants, and hiring privileges) who are responsible for team registration, team roster, safety forms, and team fees.
• Collegiate teams must have at least one professor serve as a PI. The secondary PI may be a post-doc or above.
• High School teams must have the principal or teacher as one of the PIs, and this individual must have signing authority at the high school.
• Community Labs must have the director of the community lab as one of the PIs.


• Instructor = Head coach. Provides day-to-day support and technical training for the team


• Student team leader = Team captain. Point of contact between team, PI, and iGEM HQ


• Advisor = Assistant coach. Provides supplementary support

1.4 Team Sections

There are three team sections in iGEM 2018:

1. Undergraduate Section: all student team members are age 23 or younger on March 31, 2018. This applies to both Collegiate and Community Lab Team Kinds (see Section 1.2).
2. Overgraduate Section: one or more student team members are older than 23 on March 31, 2018. This applies to both Collegiate and Community Lab Team Kinds (see Section 1.2).
3. High School Section: all student team members are high school students on March 31, 2018; includes students who graduate from high school spring 2018

All teams, regardless of their section, have the opportunity to participate in the 2018 Giant Jamboree - it will be the same event for all 3 sections.

Note: Your team's section will be calculated automatically by the iGEM software based on the ages of the student members on your team roster. Be sure to include ages for all student team members, otherwise the system will default to placing your team in the Overgraduate section even if you are an Undergraduate team.

1.5 Recommendations

Based on previous competitions, we also strongly recommend the following:

• Teams should have between 8 and 15 student team members.
• Teams with more than 15 student team members should consider splitting into two teams and taking advantage of the multiple team discount. This also gives a larger team adequate wiki space and presentation time to cover the work generated by more team members.
• Teams should be gender-balanced, having approximately as many women as men on a team.
• Teams should be composed of an interdisciplinary group of students from different majors and with different skill sets.