Team Collaborations

This year, we have updated the Medal Requirements to include team collaborations as a silver medal requirement. To help facilitate collaborations, we have made this page so teams can share information about ways they wish to collaborate to reach all of the 2017 iGEM teams.

Tell us about your Collaboration Request by sending us an email to hq AT igem DOT org .
Please include:

Name of Collaboration Request
Your Team Name
Your Team Location (Institution and Country)
Brief Collaboration Request description. This can be something that you can offer other teams or something that you are looking for from another team(s).
Your contact information - Contact Name and Email (to be posted online)

Postcards! - Team Düsseldorf Cologne
Virtual Meetup - Team NYU Abu Dhabi
Lactococcus collaboration - Team Groningen
Looking for a flow cytometer, and offering the use of varied engineering facilities/programs/knowledge - Team RHIT
Synthetic Biology / Microfluidics Survey - Team Boston University Hardware
Team collaboration spreadsheet? - Team RHIT
Foundational Advances Collaboration - Team SVCE_CHENNAI
Survey about cholera - Team INSA-UPS_France
Newsletter and Inquiry about Challenges for SynBio Teams Worldwide - Team Calgary
Virtual Meetups - Team Vilnius-Lithuania
Short tutorial videos on laboratory methods on YouTube - Team Tübingen
Global Compilation of Expert Perspectives on Biomanufacturing - Team Harvard
Survey from UNebraska-Lincoln - Team UNebraska-Lincoln
Survey from CLSB-UK - Team CLSB-UK
Biological themed card game - Team Franconia
Survey from iGEM Pasteur Paris : Air pollution - Team Pasteur Paris
Sweaty Photo Challenge - Team Aalto-Helsinki
Tasty-Style Short Lab Technique Videos - Team East_Chapel_Hill
Translation Center - Team KU Leuven
Synthetic Biology Podcast Mini-Series - Team Toronto
Podcast Series "Science out of lab" - Team Copenhagen

21. Podcast Series "Science out of lab"

Team: Copenhagen
Team Location: University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
Contact Information: igemku2017@gmail.com
Collaboration description:Through the podcast series, we want to bring science into a social, ethical and environmental context by interviewing, e.g researchers, professors, journalists, industry representatives, public. Our target audience is nonprofessionals and experts alike. Possible topics would be in relation to synthetic biology (eg, DIYbio, ethics, gene drive, design etc).

We would like to go global and involve experts and opinions from all over the world. This is where you can come along! If you have ideas of possible individuals (and intriguing topics) for the podcast from your local/national community and would like to be part of educating and spreading the word to the public, then please write to us.

20. Synthetic Biology Podcast Mini-Series

Team: Toronto
Team Location: University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada
Contact Information: Toronto team - igem [AT] g.skule.ca
Collaboration description:

The podcast aims to explore how synthetic biology intersects with different disciplines (ranging from engineering, law, business to the arts) by engaging with people active in the field. Our target audience is the general public, ie. people who don’t necessarily have a scientific background but who are curious. We invite you to participate in our mini-series, where we aim to showcase the projects of different iGEM teams through short (~5min) episodes. Please contact us if you are interested and we will get back to you with more information regarding which questions will be asked, and about how the podcast will be recorded and edited.

19. Translation Center

Team: KU Leuven
Team Location: KU Leuven - Leuven, Belgium
Contact Information: KU Leuven team - igem2017 [AT] kuleuven.be
Collaboration description:

Dear iGEM-participants

We think that science could be more accessible to the public if it was explained in their mother tongue. Therefore, as part of our collaboration commitment, we propose a translation service where teams can send in their project description and other teams can translate it into their native language.

If you want to be part of this collaboration, you can upload your project description in the Central Hub (https://drive.google.com/drive/u/1/folders/0B2T1XzPGc8giSl9meHQ1cDlYSEU). We propose that you write the description in English and make it understandable for people with minimal background knowledge. Try to translate for as many participating teams as possible. When you translated a text, please sign with your team name and language.

To let us know that you are participating, please send an email to igem2017 [AT] kuleuven.be.

18. Tasty-Style Short Lab Technique Videos

Team: East_Chapel_Hill
Team Location:East Chapel Hill High School
Chapel Hill, NC USA
Contact Information: Cecilia Lee, student leader (chaelee1125 [AT] gmail.com) or East Chapel Hill iGEM Team (echhsigem [AT]gmail.com)
Collaboration description:

We are looking for teams to collaborate with to create a series of short videos in the style of the Tasty/Tastemade Food Videos! They will be roughly 1-minute long videos on any lab techniques. The collection of the unique short videos will be posted on YouTube for other teams and the synthetic biology community to learn from!
You can fill out the interest google form here: https://goo.gl/forms/wp7X4AmTsLOaGjSA3

17. Sweaty Photo Challenge

Team: Aalto-Helsinki
Team Location: Aalto University/University of Helsinki, Finland
Contact Information: Our Facebook page or our email team[AT]aaltohelsinki.com
Collaboration description:

SWEAT TO PROTECT!

The surface of our skin contains antimicrobial peptides that protect it from outside threats, like bacteria and fungi.
One of these peptides is called dermcidin and it is naturally present in our sweat.
So when you sweat, you increase your protection against infections!

We are asking other iGEM teams to take part in our sweat challenge to promote the protective properties of sweat!
Post a picture of your team doing something sweaty with a caption and we will award the most creative and hilarious one at the Giant Jamboree.
Remember to tag our social media account (instagram: [AT] aaltohelsinki_igem, Facebook [AT] aaltohelsinki and Twitter: [AT] aaltohelsinki) and use the hashtag #iGEMsweatchallenge!

16. Survey from iGEM Pasteur Paris : Air pollution

Team: Pasteur Paris
Team Location: Institut Pasteur, Paris, France
Contact Information: igem.pasteur [AT] gmail.com, Facebook, Twitter
Collaboration description:

Dear iGEMers,

We are working on air pollution and we need your help to better target this issue. Please help us by answering and sharing the following survey :)

Do you believe the quality of the air you breath should be a major concern for all of us? Help us improve it by answering this short survey (3-4 minutes top). Thank you in advance for your help and your time!
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdLIBs-zFTtTuwKh9OhkP_pwlnGejfJ2TiNnL8R5S9pWA1A9w/viewform

Tu te sens concerné par la qualité de l'air que tu respires ? Aide nous à l'améliorer en remplissant le questionnaire ci-dessous (3-4 minutes maximum). Merci d'avance pour ton aide et ton temps!
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScJazEXL1hn8g2QR-Qftpc07y1qfuksnI1gkDBVXgyrxMN9FQ/viewform

您认为改善空气质量应该是我们重要的目标吗？为改善空气质量出一分力，填写我们的调查问卷（只需3到4分钟）。谢谢您的时间和对我们的支持。
https://sojump.com/jq/14175628.aspx

15. Biological themed card game

Team: Franconia
Team Location: Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Germany
Contact Information: email: igem.erlangen [AT] gmail.com; twitter: [AT] iGEM_Franconia
Collaboration description:

Dear iGEM community!

This year we are developing a biological themed card game. Instead of doing this all alone, we would like to include other iGEM teams and together make the game as entertaining, interesting, profound and international as possible! Therefore we are looking for teams who would help by:

- developing one or more new cards. These can be pathogens (like viruses or bacteria), cures (e.g. antibiotic, cough linctus), preventatives (e.g. vaccinations, desinfectant) or just anything that influences human health. The cards should include the name, properties and a short description.

and/or:

- translating the basic deck of cards into their national language, so that the game can be played all around the globe.

If you are interested in doing one and/or the other, please tell us before the 1st of August. We would then send you more precise information and some of the already existing cards. Also don't hesitate to contact us, if you have any questions about it!

We are very much looking forward to this and would be delighted if many of you join!

Best regards,

iGEM Franconia

14. Survey for all High School Teams

Team: CLSB-UK
Team Location: City of London School, London, UK
Contact Information: Abe Tolley, (email) a.tolley(at)cityoflondonschool.org.uk
Collaboration description:

The CLS iGEM team is trying to create a guide with advice for high school teams on how to get into iGEM, along with helpful tips and some Dos and Don'ts. Entering iGEM can be a daunting task for a high school - without funding, experience or expertise -but we hope this guide will help facilitate new teams and allow them to succeed in their project. We are looking for as many High School Teams to complete our short survey, so we can provide the best advice possible to new teams - with your help, we can help spread iGEM to more high schools around the world. Please take a few minutes to complete our survey - it would be very much appreciated.

The survey link is: https://goo.gl/forms/MYDzIEdOqpVTlRwn2.

CLSB-UK team

13. Survey from UNebraska-Lincoln

Team: UNebraska-Lincoln
Team Location:
Contact Information:
Collaboration description:

Hello 2017 iGEM teams! Our team this year is working to inhibit methane production in cattle. You can learn more at: http://igem.unl.edu/ or https://2017.igem.org/Team:UNebraska-Lincoln.

We have created a quick 10 question survey that we would love for all iGEMers to take. If your team members choose to participate, we will present your team with a badge of contribution.

Please follow this link to access the survey: https://goo.gl/forms/A3IIaD00d59Ydzx83

We would really appreciate your time and response! Thank you!!

UNL iGEM Team

12. Global Compilation of Expert Perspectives on Biomanufacturing

Team: Harvard
Team Location: Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, United States
Contact Information: Email harvardigemteam [AT] gmail.com, Facebook, Twitter ([AT]harvardigemteam)
Collaboration description:

Dear iGEM community,

What would happen if you introduced your work to the profit-driven, tightly-regulated world outside of iGEM? As individual teams, we might be able to get a few expert opinions on the implications of our work, but what if we could standardize and share the perspectives and advice we pick up along the way?

We want to explore the status of biomanufacturing (that is, using biological systems to produce substances on a commercial scale) as a growing industry around the world. This collaboration effort is relevant to almost any iGEM team, but it is especially relevant to teams on the therapeutic and manufacturing tracks. We are looking for teams interested in assembling a catalog of perspectives on biomanufacturing from leaders in business, public policy, biomedicine, environmental science and material science around the world.

We hope to develop a standard set of inquiries and conduct interviews to foster a more thorough understanding of the field of biomanufacturing around the world. We’ll then compile the information we receive, allowing teams to get a better contextualization of their work in the world. We’re looking for teams to contribute to this set of inquiries, and we’re looking for teams to implement them as well.

If you would like to get involved with this effort, please email us or reach out on Facebook or Twitter!

Best Wishes,
Harvard iGEM 2017

11. Short tutorial videos on laboratory methods on YouTube

Team: Tübingen
Team Location: Tübingen, Germany
Contact Information: igem [AT] ifib.uni-tuebingen.de
Collaboration description:

The concept idea is to create and manage a YouTube platform on which collaborating teams post different kinds of short lab tutorials and link them to their unique iGem project. The videos should promote the main idea and diversity of iGem in the field of synthetic biology.
The YouTube channel will reach out to everybody who is not yet aware of iGEM and its possibilities and will consequently encourage and inspire future iGEM teams.

A condensed YouTube channel will work as a network and multiply the reach of iGEM teams’ social media presence.

10. Virtual Meetups

Team: Vilnius-Lithuania
Team Location: Vilnius, Lithuania
Contact Information: You can contact us on our facebook or write an email to laurynas.karpus [AT] gmail.com, also you can find us on twitter! ([AT] vilnius_igem)
Collaboration description:

Dear iGEM community,
we are Vilnius-Lithuania team, and we're interested in virtual meetups to exchange the ideas that our teams are working on and to give and receive critique and other information about our projects.
We want to hold as many virtual meetups as we can until Giant Jamboree.

You can read about the project we're working on at our wiki - https://2017.igem.org/Team:Vilnius-Lithuania

9. Newsletter and Inquiry about Challenges for SynBio Teams Worldwide

Team: Calgary
Team Location: University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta (Canada)
Contact Information: igem.calgary [AT] gmail.com
Collaboration description:

Hi everyone!! The Calgary team is in the process of organizing a Canadian iGEM Newsletter. If any international teams are interested in participating as a guest, please email us! Also, we are interested in the challenges iGEM teams have, such as funding, supervision, and other resources. Feel free to fill out this form (submissions can be kept confidential if preferred): https://goo.gl/forms/BDAqemEe5kLpie8F3

The Calgary project this year is using E. coli to convert human solid waste into bioplastics on Mars. Please do contact us if you see potential for wet or dry lab collaborations!

Thank you,
The 2017 iGEM Calgary Team

8. Survey about cholera

Team: INSA-UPS_France
Team Location: Toulouse, France
Contact Information: igem.toulouse [AT] gmail.com
Collaboration description:

Dear iGEM Community, the INSA-UPS_France team created a survey dealing with Vibrio cholerae. In order to get an interesting statistical study we need as much answer as possible.
Here is the survey: https://goo.gl/forms/nzqnbNGvTheeHdDz2 Thank you!

Best Regards,
INSA-UPS_France 2017

7. Foundational Advances Collaboration

Team: SVCE_CHENNAI
Team Location: Chennai, India
Contact Information: Email at igem2017svce [AT] gmail.com or Twitter [AT] igemsvce
Collaboration description:

Dear iGEM Teams,

Our project this year is based on temperature and pH regulated genetic circuits. We are also focusing on a method to convert translational regulation to transcriptional regulation. If any other teams are working on something similar we would love to collaborate with you.

Also this year we are working on machine learning that can be applied to the registry of standard biological parts. The software faction of our project will involve building, training and testing a supervised machine learning algorithm on the collection of promoters in the iGEM registry. This algorithm when trained with sufficient data would be capable of identifying novel promoters merely by having the sequence as an input. If any team wants to characterize a sigma 70 promoter as a part of their project, they can use our software. Just email us and we'll do it for you.

Looking forward to hearing from any teams interested!

Warm Regards,
iGEM Team SVCE_CHENNAI 2017

6. Team collaboration spreadsheet?

Team: RHIT
Team Location: Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, Indiana, United States
Contact Information: Email (Preferred): yangy6 [AT] rose-hulman.edu
Collaboration description:

Hi teams,

We were thinking about constructing a spreadsheet to help organize team lab collaborations if you think that this would be useful and would like to help us develop it further, we would like your input.

Thank you,
iGEM Team RHIT 2017

5. Synthetic Biology / Microfluidics Survey

Team: Boston University Hardware
Team Location: Boston University, Boston, MA (USA)
Contact Information: Email (preferred): samperid [AT] bu.edu, or Twitter [AT] iGEMHWBU
Collaboration description:

Dear iGEM Community,

This is a request for ANY iGEM team. This year, the BU Hardware team is working on an archive that will store different microfluidic chip designs and protocols that we develop. In order to better understand how we can structure this archive to help the iGEM/Synbio community, we have created a short survey that we would like iGEM teams to fill out! You can find the survey at: https://goo.gl/forms/QcGws30fPAcdPi4p1. Thanks!

Kind Regards,
2017 BU Hardware

4. Looking for a flow cytometer, and offering the use of varied engineering facilities/programs/knowledge

Team: RHIT
Team Location: Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, Indiana, United States
Contact Information: Email (Preferred): yangy6 [AT] rose-hulman.edu. You can also contact us via Twitter [AT] RHITiGEM2017 or Facebook
Collaboration description:

Hello iGEM teams,

First, we request to collaborate with a team which has access to a flow cytometer and related equipment. Our team wishes to use the flow cytometer to analyze several of our constructs as well as compare these results with those from our plate reader.

To offer, we have access to varied engineering facilities and programs including the optical engineering (physics) labs, Solidworks and 3D-printing capabilities. Additionally, our team can provide aid in web design and complicated math modeling.

Please don't hesitate to email us if you have any special request on the use of any engineering facilities!

Best Regard,
iGEM Team RHIT 2017

3. Lactococcus collaboration

Team: Groningen (University of Groningen)
Team Location: The Netherlands
Contact Information: igem.2017.groningen [AT] gmail.com
Collaboration description:

Dear IGEM community,

This is a request for all IGEM teams working with Lactococcus lactis. As you probably already know L. lactis is an important organism for the fermentation industry and quite easy to modify, making it a promising IGEM chassis. But one disadvantage of L. lactis is its selectivity for promotors and plasmids. Although on the IGEM site many information about the functioning of promotors in either E. coli or B. subtilis can be found this is not the case for our organism.

Therefore we propose to collaborate with all IGEM teams working with L. lactis to make a database of existing or new promotors and ribosome bininding sites (RBS) and their effectiveness in L. lactis. We will make a standardized protocol to test the promotor strength using sfGFP (biobrick BBa_K1365020). For the database either existing promotors could be characterized or you could contribute new promotors and RBS, which are not yet in the iGEM distribution kit.

We think this collaboration will be of great advantage to all teams working with L. lactis now and in the future. So we hope to hear from you!

Kind regards,
iGEM team Groningen

2. Virtual Meetup

Team: NYU Abu Dhabi
Team Location: Abu Dhabi, UAE
Contact Information: Team Facebook page or email at nyuad.igem [AT] nyu.edu.
Collaboration description:

Dear iGEM Teams,

Being located in the Middle East, we have found that there are very limited resources available for rising scientists. We are fortunate to have well-stocked lab and involved PI’s aiding us in our journey, but we recognize that not all teams in this region are able to benefit from feedback due to the disparate spread of iGEM teams. Hence, we would like to reach out and hold a virtual meetup for other iGEM teams wherein we can present and receive feedback on our work as well as troubleshoot some problems we may face. This would be organized via Skype and by time zone.

If you are interested in joining, please let us know as soon as possible! We will organize a meeting as soon as we have enough interest, and we are open to holding multiple meetups over the course of the year.

We look forward to hearing from you!

Warmly,
iGEM Team NYU Abu Dhabi 2017

1. Postcards!

Team: Düsseldorf Cologne
Team Location: Germany
Contact Information: You can contact us via Twitter @IGEM17DUS_CGN, on Facebook, or send us an email: igem[AT]hhu.de .
Collaboration description:

Dear iGEM Teams,

As we all know iGEM is not only about labwork but also about bringing synthetic biology closer to the public. To do so last year’s iGEM team of the Heinrich- Heine- University of Duesseldorf started a campaign to promote synthetic biology in public using self-designed postcards. Seven other German teams decided to join us and the postcard exchange was a real success. Thrilled about the outcome of last year’s postcards, this year we would like to reach out even further and spread iGEM postcards all over Europe! The idea is that every participating team designs a postcard which shows an image related to synthetic biology, maybe even your topic, on the front and a small informational text on the back. Afterwards a batch of each team’s postcard is exchanged so that every team can share postcards from all over Europe with the people in their neighborhood and at public events etc. If you want to check out last year’s campaign, visit the wiki of Duesseldorf 2016: Postcards.

Postcards:

Image related to your project or (synthetic) biology in general on the front
Small information text on the back
Standard postcard format (A6; 14,8cm x 10,5cm)

If you are interested and want to join us please let us know until the 30th of June, so we can figure out how many postcards each team should print!

We’re looking forward to hearing from you!

Kind regards,
iGEM Team Düsseldorf Cologne 2017!

Teams/Collaborations

Team Collaborations