Team:Edinburgh UG/Collaborations

Edinburgh iGEM 2018

Collaborations

Let's do something together!

Collaboration in science is one of the most important steps to succeed. You are very good at your field but struggling in the other? It is not a problem at all when you are open and you are not afraid to ask for help or you can help someone. Meeting other people while working on a science project is also essential. Other people with their fresh mind might easily notice why something may go wrong, suggest new ideas or just share their opinion. So, let's collaborate!


Modelling Collabortation

DNA Degradation Switch Protocols

1. Introduction

Our DNA Degrading Switch requires the transformation of 2 plasmids prior to maxicell induction in order to function. Construct pImm contains a coding sequence for Dnase Colicin E2’s immunity protein Imm2 and an upstream recognition site for homing endonuclease I-SceI. Construct pCol contains a coding sequence for Dnase Colicin E2. By transforming pImm into DL2524 (maxicell progenitor strain) culturing successful transformants, transforming construct pCol and carrying out maxicell induction the DNA degrading switch becomes active. By exposing DL2524 to arabinose homing endonuclease I-SceI is induced, this degrades the chromosome of DL2524 and linearises pImm preventing further expression of Imm2. With its immunity protein no longer being expressed Colicin E2 should become active around 24hrs later degrading the DNA remaining within our Maxicell.

2. Delivery Contents

Tube Label Contents
DL2524 Culture Liquid culture of the strain DL2524 (LB with chloramphenacol and 0.5% glucose).
DL2524 STAB DL2524 in nutrient agar with chloramphenicol and 0.5% glucose.
ISce-1 Imm2 1 pSB1C3 with ISce-1 site and Imm2 genes.
ISce-1 Imm2 8 pSB1C3 with ISce-1 site and Imm2 genes.
E2 2 Full Colicin E2 gene with BioBrick prefix and suffix
E2 4 Full Colicin E2 gene with BioBrick prefix and suffix
1st gBlock of 1st half of Colicin E2 gene (with over lap for 2nd part)
2nd gBlock of 2nd half og Colicin E2 gene
Table 1: Delivery Contents

3. Protocols


Meetups

As one of the most important collaborations we attendend two meetups and hosted one as well.

Scottish iGEM Meetup

As our first meetup we attended Scottish iGEM Meetup which was held at The University of St Andrews and hosted by St Andrews iGEM 2018 team at 3rd of July. Hence, all three schottish teams participated (St Andrews, Edinburgh_OG and us). We first presented our projects, had a discussion about them and as well we had some talks on useful topics as human practices, collaborations, etc. We were delighted to talk with WIll Wright, Europen Ambassador of iGEM community.

iGEM UK Meetup

We attended iGEM meetup UK which was organised by SynBioUK and hosted by University of Oxford iGEM team at 12th-13th July 2018. It was an amazing experience to meet almost all UK teams and talk with our collegues from the same field about projects getting very valuable feedback. Moreover, it was one of the first experience to present our project as well. We attended a number of workshops and talks of speakers, including Dr. John Collins, Dr. Tom Ellis, Dr. Piers Millet, and Dr. Karen Polizzi.

Hosting Meetup with Newcastle team

If you have ever heard about The Edinburgh Festival Fringe (the world's largest arts festival) you probably know how crazy it gets with hundreds of thousands of people hanging around. Thus, on 20th of August, we decided to step back for one day from wet lab work and invited Newcastle iGEM team to talk and discuss our projects and then to see some comedy shows afterwards. Both teams had some comments for each other, and we were very happy to share the experience.


Bits and pieces

Besides meetups, labwork, we also had talks and chats with many other iGEM teams, as it always nice to have a chat about something different.

Mike the Microbe

Mike the microbe from Carroll iGEM team visited us. It was so nice to have a picture of a beautiful sciency bacteria on our lab bench!


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