Team:Toronto/PolicyAndPractices/Syntalks
As our project progressed, PnP started constructing 2 projects that would help us battle two stigmas that surrounded our project, these two projects were later meant to feed back into project design and help assure the public. That now, our product is safe. Within iGEM Toronto we had conducted bioethics workshops for all our general members, and within those workshops we had various debates about controversial topics in synthetic biology from gene drives to GMO agriculture. We realized all our debates were fueled because of certain parties fearing GMOs or showing indifference because of their lack of knowledge on the subject, which incentivized us to make a podcast series, SynTalks, on the intention of educating the general public on the prolifera of work done with the help of synthetic biology in the fields of medicine, agricultural, environment, policy and engineering. We wanted to emphasize that synthetic biology isn't just restricted to “frankenstein” GMO foods in your grocery stores. Here are some highlights from our conversations with them:
Episode 1: Kathleen Hefferon
“I was really interested how something as tiny and basic as a virus can cause so much destruction to life.”
“The most I learned, the more sophisticated they [viruses] got” [….] ”Soon I realized that they could be harnessed in ways that are helpful and not harmful to the planet.”
“People are easy to sway through mass media, the internet or fake news outlets so people become unsure and uncertain about what the truth really is.”
“Scientists have not nearly been as good at communicating their research as they should be and it’s hard for us to get out of the lab and talk to the people about science” […] “We need to do a better job at it”.
“The most important thing for students to know is [to] think of what they’re learning as transferable skills that they can use in the future.”
Episode 2: Dr. Jennifer Mitchell, Cell & Systems Biology, University of Toronto
“My research is about figuring out how the human genome works to build specialized cells in our body. Every cell in our body has pretty much the same sequence of DNA, but different genes are turned on in different cell types, so they can do what they need to do. [...] Actually, the vast majority of human genes does not code for genes, and it’s what is called non-coding. In the past, this was referred to as junk DNA, but we now know that hiding in these non-coding parts of our genome are important instructions for when genes should turn on and off, and my research is about finding these instructions and figuring out how they work.”
“I was initially very interested in development, and how one single cell can develop into an entire complex organism, and the more I learned about the complex process required inside our cells to allow them to develop these specialized functions, the more I wanted to figure out how one genome sequence could direct such a complex process.”
“Now, at the University of Toronto, I study both embryonic and neural stem cells, and how they maintain their specialized abilities to both self-renew -- to make more stem cells -- and also differentiate into multiple cell types.”
“What I tell [undergraduates] is that they should be thinking deeply about what interests them most as they take different courses during their degree, and that they should seek out research and other experiential learning opportunities in those areas.”
“What I like most about what I do is that it’s problem-solving based, and that my research is driven by my curiosity and the curiosity of students in my lab. When we discover something new, we get to share it with the rest of the scientific community to advance our collective knowledge, and that’s really exciting.”
“We’re all still students of biology, even when we’re professors, and that keeps the work really exciting.”
Episode 3: Noeline Subramaniam
“My research aims to address the question: why are blood vessels dysregulated in different disease conditions?”
“I think GMO’s are safe” […]”What we’re doing with genetic engineering is that we’re selecting for specific genes, but we’re introducing these specific genes into this organism.”
Doing a PhD is a huge endeavour, and a hard one […] Inherently, if you chose to do a PhD, you posses a lot of curiosity […] It’s a very difficult thing to do. It’s a lot of failure, it takes a lot of perseverance, and it’s a lot of years that you’re putting in.”
In addition to medicine, we also interviewed environmental and agriculture experts. Here are some highlights from our conversations with them:
Episode 4: Patrick Diep, Chemical Engineering, University of Toronto
“In the year I’ve been doing my Masters, I’ve been learning more about what’s being done by bacteria, or other microorganisms, for bioremediation of wastewater, and what I’ve noticed is there’s a problem: that people aren’t using a particular mechanism that bacteria can use to absorb and accumulate heavy metals. [..] What I’m trying to do is understand how to use [bacterial] proteins that are able to capture these heavy metals, as a method to bioremediate the wastewater, but also to extract the metals from the wastewater, so we can reuse them later.”
“I began to see the flaws, and what was being done already, for using microbes and microorganisms for wastewater treatment. And as I started writing proposals for grants and scholarships, this passion became more sophisticated, and then I started realizing what these specific flaws were. And so I designed my project to address these specific problems, by understanding these proteins and how they transport and capture these heavy metals, and maybe engineering these sorts of protein-based systems to capture the heavy metals.”
“What’s important when you’re applying to grad school, or making a big decision in your life regarding your education, is to be flexible in the options and opportunities that kind of pop up, because I didn’t think that taking my synthetic biology or biochemistry experience to environmental research was really going to make a big impact, but sometimes there are other things you need to consider that gear you towards the right direction.”
Episode 5: Dr. Grace Skogstad, Political Science, University of Toronto
“My research is looking at why different countries regulate plant biotechnology differently, and plant biotechnology refers, of course, to genetically modified crops and foods. And it’s very interesting for me because there’s a lot of conflict around the regulation of genetically modified crops and foods.”
“For farmers who started to grow GM crops, the promise has always been economic gain: that they would reduce the cost of production and be more competitive, vis-a-vis competitors. So, there are real economic gains and losses here. The other thing is that, for other people who are not quite so interested in the economic profits of biotechnology, there are concerns about the social and economic implications of this, and the ethical concerns, as well, regarding whether it’s right to tamper with nature [...] there are substantial social, economic, and ethical concerns.”
“For political scientists, we want to understand under what circumstances do social movements and farmers get mobilized, and then who wins and loses.”
“The science [on GM crops] is that they’re safe for humans to consume. Where there seems to have been a bit more scientific controversy, or division, is around their effects on the environment. So, there are questions about whether GM crops are sort of ‘super-crops’ that can invade other species and overwhelm them.”
“It comes down, really, to whether people want to eat them or not. It’s a matter of preference, rather than, I think, of safety.”
“The implications for farmers in developing countries are quite a bit different than they are for farmers in, say, Canada, the United States, and Europe, where farmers do tend to be subsidized, quite often by the government. So we may have some poor farmers, but it’s not the same consideration as in Africa, and some of the poorer countries of Asia [...] where that you have to buy your seed again every year from the plant biotechnology company -- that’s a cost.”
Episode 6: Valar Anoop PhD, Senior Biologist, Biotechnology, Health Canada
What are your concerns for our project?
“[The questions we would ask are the following:] What mechanism is being used to do the bioremediation and if an organism, like E.coli is being used, how was it modified and what new characteristics does it have after the modification? And where does the characteristic come from? We would also look into the possible harm presented to the environment and human health. Could the modified organism have adverse effects on the environment or people who come in contact with the organism?”
Episode 7: Scott Proulx
“Everything that we have that's considered non-GMO has been modified just over thousands and thousands of years from the beginning of agriculture... what's the difference between doing that and going very precisely into the genome so that Evolution happens within months as suppose to thousands of years.” -Scott Proulx
“The world is changing whether you believe [it] or not, we're coming across water shortages and changing climates and we're going to need crops that are more resistant and have higher yields and we can't do that with just regular crops we're going to need super crops in order to feed the world.” -Scott Proulx
“Synthetic biology is a tool you can use to affect some kind of change in an organism” -Scott Proulx
Episode 8: Locke Davenport Huyer
Generally people are excited about outcomes they're excited about things that make people healthier, make people live longer but they get scared when they have to get into a science that they don't understand. We live in a world where people are becoming more polarized into an area of people who know a lot about science and people who know very little about science. And when you know very little about science, that tends to impact how your fear of the unknown grows. -Locke Davenport Huyer
The public is paying for our research, generally. Research grants is what generates the possibility for research, and that comes from tax dollars. So the public deserves a voice but it's our duty to educate the public on what their voice needs. -Locke Davenport Huyer
Our curriculum in the public educational system has over time morphed into either you are "good" at math and science or not good at math and science, and those who consider themselves not good at math and science tend to learn nothing about science. So a push in the educational system should be to require more science learning not necessarily in "what is a cell" but to encourage more critical thinking of scientific projects. -Locke Davenport Huyer