Difference between revisions of "Team:Kingsborough NY"

Organisms engineered by synthetic biologists have the potential to deliver biological solutions to a wide range of problems. However, they must be implemented responsibly in any setting. Last year the Kingsborough team focused on engineering E. coli, to deteriorate nitrogenous waste in sewage more effectively. However, E. coli can survive in local waterways where treated wastewater ends up therefore introducing foreign genetic material into the environment that can cause irreparable harm to the environment. This year the Kingsborough 2017 iGEM team looked for an environmentally responsible mechanism to prevent such a scenario through the “kill-switch”. With this “kill-switch” we will be able to destroy any escaped modified E. coli from the treatment plant. This year we attempted to develop a light-inducible kill switch as designed by Ohlendorf et al., that would have the bacteria thrive in a light-free environment like a sewage treatment plant and perish in a light environment like the local waterways. Other teams have proposed and modeled such switches, but few have successfully built, implemented, and characterized such devices. We will be building upon our past design, as well as improving and completing a previously proposed light-inducible kill switch (the design of team [https://2016.igem.org/Team:Wageningen_UR Wageningen from 2016]). This year the Kingsborough team faced many barriers to completing the project. For instance, the lab space lacked a red room to grow the light-sensitive E.coli which introduced unwanted expression and the lab space lacked a spectroscopy machine to complete any DNA ligation and Gibson assembly. However, we came up with cheap solutions to these technical barriers that we can introduce to the iGEM community.

@@ Line 11: / Line 11: @@
 <img src="https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/3/3a/T--Kingsborough_NY--lighthouse_logo1.jpg" style="float:left;margin:20px">
-<font size="6" face="Garamond" color="black">
+Organisms engineered by synthetic biologists have the potential to deliver biological solutions to a wide range of problems. However, they must be implemented responsibly in any setting.
-Welcome to the home page for the 2017 iGEM team from <a href="http://www.kbcc.cuny.edu/Pages/default.aspx" target="new">Kingsborough Community College </a>, part of the City University of New York System. We are located in Brooklyn, NY, and represent one of the top 4 community colleges in the nation. This year, we are trying to create a light-activated kill switch. Our bacteria will truly be creatures of the night (and darkness), like the Phantom of the Opera!
-<br><br>
+Last year the Kingsborough team focused on engineering <i>E. coli,</i> to deteriorate nitrogenous waste in sewage more effectively. However, <i>E. coli</i> can survive in local waterways where treated wastewater ends up therefore introducing foreign genetic material into the environment that can cause irreparable harm to the environment. This year the Kingsborough 2017 iGEM team looked for an environmentally responsible mechanism to prevent such a scenario through the “kill-switch”. With this “kill-switch” we will be able to destroy any escaped modified <i>E. coli</i> from the treatment plant.
-Our project For more information about our project, including our motivation, our design, modelling, and our results, please use the links on the menu.
-</font>
+This year we attempted to develop a light-inducible kill switch as designed by Ohlendorf <i>et al.</i>, that would have the bacteria thrive in a light-free environment like a sewage treatment plant and perish in a light environment like the local waterways.  Other teams have proposed and modeled such switches, but few have successfully built, implemented, and characterized such devices. We will be building upon our past design, as well as improving and completing a previously proposed light-inducible kill switch (the design of team [https://2016.igem.org/Team:Wageningen_UR Wageningen from 2016]).
+This year the Kingsborough team faced many barriers to completing the project. For instance, the lab space lacked a red room to grow the light-sensitive <i>E.coli</i> which introduced unwanted expression and the lab space lacked a spectroscopy machine to complete any DNA ligation and Gibson assembly. However, we came up with cheap solutions to these technical barriers that we can introduce to the iGEM community.
 </html>