Origin of Our Work

With the progress of the topics in the laboratory, we have also learned about that public lack the knowledge of cancer, cancer treatment and new cancer therapy. Therefore, we believe that we should not only limit the project in the laboratory, but also go out of the laboratory and go into the society to fill the public's knowledge blind spots, and eliminate their misunderstanding of science and technology.

Society Cognition

We took to the streets to investigate the public in order to understand the public's awareness of scientific knowledge. The interview took place in three places, Xinjiekou Commercial District, called China's first business district, Nanjing South Railway Station, the largest railway station in Asia, and Xiamafang Heritage Park, a century-old scenic spot. These three locations have great traffic and a complete demographic structure.

Public awareness of cancer knowledge have been known through interview and questionnaire. There are some points we found out according to results of interview and questionnaire:

1. People have a low level of understanding of scientific knowledge about cancer, almost have no knowledge of new cancer therapies.

2. As people grow older, their knowledge of cancer will grow. One reason for this is that there are more and more cancer patients around them.

3. Middle-aged and elderly people pay attention to health knowledge, they perform better than young people in health and they have a more correct concept of health.

General public lacks scientific knowledge and has long been misled by pseudoscience. This is a common phenomenon in today's society.

Detailed results of questionnaire see in this PDF document (download 1).

Access to Knowledge

In order to gain scientific authority knowledge about cancer, which will be used for publicity, we interviewed several researchers who have made great achievements in the field of cancer treatment working in Shanghai Institute of Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences. They gave us authority knowledge about cancer and lately cancer treatment. Some words they said made us feel the social responsibility on the shoulders.

“Treating a disease is not an individual's behavior. It requires the participation of the government. The degree of development of the entire social welfare system depends on whether the various links of life, death, and death receive extra help.” By Prof. Wang Hongyan

“Intellectual property rights should not be greater than human rights, and money should not be more important than human life. The government should assume this responsibility with medical insurance or other forms.” By Prof. Ji Hongbin

“At present, many pharmaceutical companies in China are also growing, and they will have such capabilities in a few years.” By Prof. Yang Chenghua

“Scientific research is not so easy.” By Prof. Meng Feilong

More details of interview see in this PDF document (download 2).

Science Popularization Campaign

With the scientific authority knowledge about cancer, we started publicity and education for the public. Sun Yat-sen Mausoleum, a very famous historic site, with the huge traffic, is the place where we held our activity. From June to September, we have organized a total of six events with huge social impact.

We promote science popularization through forms such as exhibition boards and brochures. The content covers cancer common sense such as cancer causes, cancer treatment methods, etc., and also introduces synthetic biology and the project of our team. Our activity is in various forms, not only a simple introduction, but also includes some games about scientific knowledge.

Larger Influence & Further Vision

Nanjing Daily, one of the famous media in China, have many readers, reported our work on popularizing scientific knowledge to general public. The broad social response spurred by this report, our work has been recognized and appreciated by the public. We also promote through the WeChat public account, a new media in China. Online popularization also has accumulated a large amount of reading and has produced a wide range of social impacts.

In the future, we want to expend our activity to the whole society, eliminate fake-science and spread authoritative scientific knowledge to general public. In order to achieve this, we must corporate with government. We have get connect with relevant government officers and further work is being negotiated.

Middle School: Enlightenment

Synthetic biology as a new branch of biology is very useful and powerful. It’s a pity that, however, it is not well-known. Middle school students, with creativity and knowledge is who we want to enlighten with knowledge of synthetic biology. We want to inspire their creativity and use synthetic biology to create something that benefits society.

From October 2017 to October 2018, we held joint synthetic biology science training camp with Jinling Middle School by monthly lecture. We brought them with synthetic biology and its lately application. As the activity progressed, the students' understanding of synthetic biology deepened and the enthusiasm for learning increased. In the last few lessons, they gave us a description of the synthetic biology and the highest ideals of synthetic biology in their minds. We are deeply impressed by their creativity.

After the event, we exchanged ideas with the school officers. The school officer expressed its willingness to try to build an iGEM team belonging to Jinling Middle School. They hope to get our help and support. We also expressed our willingness to work with them to build a team which full of love for synthetic biology and creativity.

College: Professional

Compared with our education activity in middle school, our education activity in college is more professional and more targeted. We held lectures about synthetic biology and organized competition called “agar art”, which allows competitors using microorganisms create artworks on agar medium. We also allow students get into our lab and see what we do everyday. We successfully spread synthetic biology knowledge and philosophy and let a group of students get into it.