As we mentioned in our background, there is a number of microorganism in our daily life which could cause disease infection and give off stink. This year our team aims to popularize our PLA&2-PE to change the situation caused by harmful bacteria. After we went to Environmental Protection Bureau for our human practice, we thought the condition in garbage can is much more complicated than we imagine. So we temporarily focus on the microbe pollution in our laboratory, which may cause by abandoned pipettetips, waste of medium, diverse biological reagent and so on. And the stink releases by the garbage gives us intuitive feelings and bothered us.

After we learnt about the characterization of PLA and 2-PE, we would like to give this problem a nice try.

Garbage lid

Irregular experimental operation is common but serious somehow, which could cause infection of disease. The pointed part of used pipettetips and different biological reagent are breeding grounds for bacteria. As the laboratory is the place we went to the most frequently and the garbage usually is not properly processed, this problem needs attention.

We designed our engineered bacteria in a special container, a garbage lid, to deal with this situation. We put it in the laboratory baker, constitutive promoter will bring PLA and 2-PE into play, to inhibit the growth in the experimental garbage and release roselike aromatic at the same time.

Taking biosafety into account, we added toxin protein, mazf, as a suicide gene, linking with light-control promoter to prevent our engineered bacteria revealing to the outer environment than the garbage lid.

The promoter could be induced at visible light. Once the bacteria revealed from the container, mazf will express to cleavage the mRNA. And this is the rreason that we use light-proof ingredient to 3D-printed our garbage lid. . (Details can be found on our Application page.)
Within the laboratory can be controlled, we demonstrated the efficiency of PLA sterilization. And we also got the most comfortable concentration of 2-PE according to the data of our human practice.(Details can be found on our Human Practices page.)

Bromidrosis

After came up with the idea to solve the outer environment, we found the human environment is also interesting. Aim at another stink caused by bacteria, the bromidrosis is also an unpleasant smell which bothers people around. Two new circuits are applying to the goal of controlling bromidrosis.
When people sweat, there is specific salt concentration and temperature on the skin. We choose this feature as a starting point, designing a logical gate to produce PLA. Every basic component serves respective functions. dsrA is a temperature promoter from E.coli, more active at 37 degree than 25 degree. The osmotically control promoter proU provides sensitivity to the salt concentration from 0M to 0.3M. And global-regulate protein HNS which could specifically bind to osmotically control promoter proU, we use it as a specific repressor to inhibit the promoter downstream.

When the circuits on the skin, temperature reaches 37 degree, the repressor protein LacI will be expressed to inhibit PlacI, the H-NS won’t be revealed. Then, once people sweat, the Na+ and Cl- will induce proU, the logical gate became “on” state.

The circuit doesn’t need to be “on” state, when it store at room temperature. Temperature stays below 37 degree, the temperature promoter will not work. The function of PlacI BBa_R0011 has become a constitutive promoter. The global regulate protein H-NS will be expressed to inhibit proU. Then the logical gate will be “off” state.
Then, the 2-PE part, we developed a switch which realize the transform from producing mode to suicide mode. TetO & TetR are common logic elements used in synthetic biology, linking with 2-PE and mazF.

Without the induction of arabinose, TetR and mazF won’t be expressed, and production of 2-PE maintained at a normal level.

If the user would like to stop the 2-PE production, adding tiny concentration of arabinose will be able to achieve. TetR will be expressed to inhibit TetO and mazF caused cell death.
We currently use GFP and RFP to characterize the expression of our circuits. And we’re also trying to get further data results. (Details can be found on our Results page.)

The “smell game”

To integrate public opinions and concerns into the scientific process is increasingly important as new biological inventions could influence the humanity as a whole, the environment and our coexistence with nature. In our project, we encountered a problem, it is not clear what the most favorable concentration of 2-PE. To seek answer and integrate people’s opinions into our project, we designed the “smell game” to get the public involved, which we prepared different concentration of 2-PE, 3M2H and some other substances to let people smell and knew about their feelings. From the feedback, we found the majority of people think 10mmol/L of 2-PE is the most pleasant, and which guided us to improve our experiment. (More details on our Integrated HP page)

Public Activity

During the 110th anniversary of our school

In 2017, we welcomed our school’s 110th anniversary, when tens of thousands of people from all over the world came to our school to celebrate 110th birthday of FJNU (Fujian Normal University) together. It was the most lively and biggest gathering in our school, and we seized the opportunity to hold a public activity, engaging the public in showing the possibilities of synthetic biology and getting more people to know about iGEM. We made some posters about previous excellent projects for exhibition and designed some interesting games to introduce iGEM and synthetic biology. Our activity finally turned out to be a great success, more people learned about what iGEM is and what we can do with synthetic biology.

Calling for environmental protection

In the process of conducting our project, we found that the unpleasant smell and environment of garbage can surrounding us is not paid much attention, but that does have an influence on people’s lives. We organized a public activity in cooperation with volunteer association, to popularize knowledge of waste sorting and appeal to the public to try their best to protect the environment, which we prepared intriguing games and propaganda posters.

Events & Communication

the first iGEM Eurasian meetup 2018

We participated in the first iGEM Eurasian meetup 2018 in Shenzhen, where we firstly presented our project on a more formal occasion. As the team representing our school to participate in iGEM for the first time, we constantly communicate with obvious experienced iGEMers and sought advice from experts during the conference. There had we also a collision of ideas with other teams.

the 5th CCiC

We took part in the 5th CCiC (Conference of China iGEMer Community) in Shanghai, which is the biggest gathering of iGEMers in China, aiming to promote the development of synthetic biology and improve the connectivity and communication of nationwide iGEM teams. On the conference, we made a preview and experienced the atmosphere of Giant Jamboree in advance. Also we established good friendship with other teams and got lots of useful advice to improve our project.

Communicate with other teams

It is of great importance to share experience and exchange ideas with others, which makes iGEM more wonderful and helps us find out our shortcomings. This year, we communicated and collaborated with many teams. (More details on our Collaborations page)

Team:FJNU-China/Design

Design

Overview