Team:BIT-China/HPSilver
INTRODUCTION
In the past iGEM competitions, human practice was always the vital and indispensable element.As a group of creators, we devoted ourselves to producing a practical and effective Bio machine.To achieve that tough goal, we need to not only spend a ton of time in the lab but also do something relative to the society which will be our target consumer and real beneficiary.Therefore, we took some actions .we designed the questionary and gave them out on the website and different communities to see whether people were interested in our project.To find out the existing questions among the sweeteners found already and to improve our project, we interview some relevant authoritative experts.Besides, market demand and trading policy are also significant for us to know about and that’s why we went and discussed with Sixin Wang, the chief engineer of SdicZhongluFruitJuiceCo., Ltd(the NO.1 company that focuses on producing concentrated apple juice) and some of the bosses in the COFCO (the one of the top 500 corporations and the most advanced food suppliers in China ) right after we finished our original plan.In the later period, we organized Beijing University, Lanzhou University and Jilin University to have a large scale conference to popularize iGEM and collected the critical advice so that we can be improved.On the final stage, we met the bosses of COFCO again and we were proudly encouraged by them and they believed that we were likely to be successful in the future market.
QUESTIONARY
During we were sending out the questionaries on the website and communities, we realized that different people prefer various flavors, but most of them still were the fans of sweetness which make people feel happy and warm. According to what we found, there is an excellent opportunity for us to research the sweet food.Prior to we design the specific plan, it is necessary for us to learn about the existing questions relevant to the sweeteners that have been observed already.
INTERVIEWING THE EXPERTS
After we interviewed the specialists who are famous in the food and sweeteners area, the current situation of sweeteners was getting clearer in our mind.Generally, most of them used by us have the main shortages which are high calories and bad taste even though they might be very sweet.We based the human sweetness receptor on our design and hypothesized to construct the signal conduction path in the yeast
VISIT SOME AUTHORITATIVE CORPORATIONS
After we interviewed the specialists who are famous in the food and sweeteners area, the current situation of sweeteners was getting clearer in our mind.Generally, most of them used by us have the main shortages which are high calories and bad taste even though they might be very sweet.We based the human sweetness receptor on our design and hypothesized to construct the signal conduction path in the yeast
VISIT SOME AUTHORITATIVE CORPORATIONS
When several constructions of gene had been finished and tests had been carried out, the COFCO which is the one of the top 500 corporations and the most advanced food suppliers in China became our next interviewee.Some of the managers showed up to welcome us and they are the principal of innovating new product—Mrs.Zhao, the one of vice chairmen of the company—Mr.Huang and the doctor who is responsible for the manipulating of electronic tongue technique—Mr.Liu.We had a long but meaningful chat about the current device used by most of the food producing companies, which made us realize that the generally used machine’s range is so limited that it is hard to measure the sweetness conveniently as well as some devices like electronic tongue technique would only be efficient after the association with the assessment given by workers, which results in the humongous uncertainty.Therefore, an innovative bio system which relies on Synthetic Biology to observe and select new types of sweeteners will have a non-negligible contribution to the society.Finally, we accept the advice which came from COFCO and what they suggest is to let us start with some classical and conventional sweeteners like stevia rebaudiana, liquorice and Momordica grosvenori.
COOPERATION WITH OTHER UNIVERSITIES
At the latter phases of our project, we organized Beijing University, Lanzhou University and Jilin University etcetera to make a big chat about what we had done so far and held three scientific speeches to introduce the development and the common use of sweeteners in our daily life, which contributed to the increase of popularity of iGEM as well as Synthetic Biology.Ultimately, we collected the critical advice from the audiences in time and accept one of them, which recommended us to set saccharose as the standard, after that running the test would be more reasonable.
VISIT COFCO AGAIN
When we had run the experiments for several months and attained a certain achievements, we decided to visit COFCO again to show what we had done and what we expected to do in the future, which thoroughly pleased almost all of managers shown up and made them create the idea that cooperating with us afterwards as they appreciated our bio machine and figured that it is likely be a successful innovation in the future market.
