Team:CIEI-BJ/Attributions
Our team was organized by International Teenager Competition and Communication Center (ITCCC) in January 2018, following 12 days of professional training in fundamental theory and experimental operation on molecular biology and synthetic biology.
After several months of brainstorming and conducting literature reviews, we decided we wanted to establish a detection and degrading system for aflatoxin B1. With our new detection method successfully worked, then we worked on several enzymes we thought might be able to degrade aflatoxin. However, as we reviewed the experimental result from our first two enzymes, ADTZ and BacC, we realized that our preliminary idea was unlikely to be successful. Instead, we are now aiming to develop a data library for enzymes that might be able to degrade aflatoxin. We are developing this data library by using our previous results as well as testing the function of new enzymes (e.g. F420).
Since the establishment of our team, we have received guidance from academic advisers from the University of Science and Technology Beijing and Beijing Institute of Technology. We also received lectures from Ms. Qu on genetics (e.g. on the transcription and translation from DNA to amino acid, principles of gel electrophoresis, lac and tryptophan operon, and the process of PCR).
Despite the fact that our team members study and live in different cities and provinces in China, we have embraced this challenge and used innovative solutions to help push our project forward. We convened during summer vacations and all other public holidays to work on our project. We conducted our experiments in two laboratories located in Beijing and Nanjing. Since the team members study at different schools, we have made full use of modern telecommunication technology including WeChat and QQ. Since the team’s inception, we have held telephone conferences every week to communicate on our work’s progress. We have thoroughly enjoyed this project and would like to thank all related people at CIEI-BJ and elsewhere. Without their invaluable support, this project would not have been possible.
Chang Ren: As leader of the team, Chang Ren organized group meetings and planned the research project. She monitored project progress, conducted laboratory experiments, and was also responsible for team members’ safety education and supervision.
Xinyi Feng：As head of the experiment team, Xinyi Feng conducted experiments, arranged expert interviews, and coordinated collaboratios with other teams.
Jiangqian Xie: As head of the human practices (HP) team, Jiangqian Xie was responsible for the notices and minutes of group meetings. She also collected learning materials and co-authored the questionnaires and the wiki HP.
Yuxin Jiang: Yuxin Jiang led the design work, including the team’s emblem, uniform and posters. Her responsibilities also included conducting laboratory experiments.
Ruyu Wang: Ruyu Wang was responsible for experiment design and implementation, as well as the design of the first draft posters.
Yuanwei He: Yuanwei make significant contributions to the project design and the project plan. In addition, she engaged in experiments and shared research notes with other team members.
Jiayi Zhang: Jiayi Zhang was a member of the experiment team. In addition she authored and implemented the team’s business plan and composed the team song. Three out of our four enterprise sponsorship came out of her efforts.
Haomin Leng：Haomin Leng was a member of the experiment team. He also co-designed and implemented the HP questionnaire.
Zheyu Guo: Zheyu Guo contributed significantly to the background research of the project, including identifying the article which inspired the entire project. He was also responsible for publicizing the project to enterprises and successfully acquired funding from a company.
Zhenyu Xiong: Zhenyu Xiong is in charge of InterLab and completed the project submission. He also made significant contributions to the questionnaire research and an expert visit in HP.
Haolun Cheng: As a member of wiki group, Haolun Cheng collected team members’ materials to construct the photo portfolio and edited the team introduction video. He also participated in Interlab experiments.
Ao Lei: As a member of experiment team and organizer of fund raising, Ao Lei made significant contributions to the material collection and compiling of the wiki.
Yu Zhu: As a member of experiment team, Yu Zhu promoted and participated in social research and expert visits. She also did a lot of work on future direction of our project.
Xinyu Cheng: Xinyu Cheng led the background research of the project and authored the Background section. She is also a member of wiki team responsible for code writing and information upload.
Huajie Zhang: Huajie Zhang is an important member of the experiment group and participated in the lab work in Nanjing. She is also a major member of modeling group and contributed much to the survey.
Throughout the design and implementation of our project, we received invaluable support from Beijing Institute of Technology, Nanjing University, University of Science & Technology Beijing and Chinese Academy of Sciences, all of whom provided excellent facilities for our training and experiments.
We are also very grateful to former iGEM participants from BIT-China as well as Bowen Xiao for sharing their expertise with us.
We would also like to thank BFSUICC-China and UST Beijing for their support during the whole process of our project. Thanks must also go to the guidance from Zhang Wei of the wiki team, to the positive comments from Cao Mingming and Xia Mian on the direction of our research, to Zhang Huai, Sun Juncong and Cao Tianjun for their advice on our experiments, and to Professor Song for his instruction on InterLab.
Heartfelt thanks also go to Professor Shi from University of Science & Technology Beijing and Dr. Wu from Laboratory of Quality and Safety Risk Assessment for Cereal Products for their kind acceptance of our visits.
We feel very thankful to the fund support from CropLife, Changsha Hansen, KWS and Bayer Cropscience (China) Co., Ltd.
Last but not least, we give special thanks to our Adviser Team.