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We have got some exciting news! Not only did we make a lot of progress in the drylab and wetlab, but also in the category of sponsoring. Today we officially launch our crowdfunding! Scroll down for more detail and other exciting news.

Help us and get your own E. Coli cartoon on our Facebook and website!

In order to develop our system, we engineer bacteria to produce Cas13a: the protein that will make the detection of antibiotic resistance possible. Cas13a needs to be extracted from the bacteria. This purification process is very expensive because of all necessary lab equipment. Think of enzymes, buffers and columns. We require your help to be able to do this and thus ask for a small donation to make our research possible!

Wetlab

Last month the lab work really intensified! First of all, the Drying Proteins were successfully expressed and purified. Now this module is starting to characterise the proteins and do cool drying experiments. The vesicles module is in its final stage and will soon be merged into one of the other modules. It was shown that vesicles are formed and GFP is transported into the periplasm.On top of that, when combining both plasmids, the GFP ended up in the vesicles! Cas13a is now split up in two parts; one focusing on the purification and one focusing on the construct. Final design is moving towards detecting tetracycline resistance under various conditions. What kind of successes will our last month bring us?!

Drylab

This month the drylab team has made great progress. The lattice model for the TDPs is getting more and more detailed. It will not be long before we do our first simulations and determine the most suitable TDP for drying our Cas13a protein. At the same time, the team is developing a target specificity model to get a better understanding of how the Cas13a finds and binds its target RNA. Last but not least, the drylab team is also supporting the wetlab team with data analysis and experimental design. For example, designing suitable crRNAs for guiding our Cas13a protein to relevant targets.

Integrated Human Practises: A Farmer's Story

This month we have been focussing on working out our Integrated Human Practices project by interviewing a couple of stakeholders. One of the highlights of not only the IHP but also our final design was a visit to a milk farmer called Paul Oosthoek at Oosthoek en Zn VOF. He explained us the protocols they use in case of Mastitis diagnosis. Dik Mevius and Fimme Jan van der Wal, both experts in the field of antibiotic resistance concerning Mastitis, were wonderful guides who explained us more about relevant genes to detect. Also, Cecile van der Vlugt and Mark van Passel from RIVM shared their vision about safety and relevance requirements. With these helpful inputs in mind we are finalizing our IHP and the design of our device. Stay tuned for our newsletter next month, as this one will contain the full revelation of our IHP project!

Activities

Prison Island

On the 10th of August, our lab was under general maintenance, so we decided to do some teambuilding activities! We went to Prison Island, where we had to escape prison cells by completing puzzles and games. Guess what? We escaped! Satisfied with our accomplishment, we had one more drink. Some of the adrenaline junkies also took the chance to go karting at the same location!

Aftermovie Symposium

This month we uploaded the aftermovie of our European iGEM Meetup 2017! We are looking back on this day with lots of joy and laughter, and are looking forward to seeing all of the 33 attending teams again in Boston. Take a look

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We were invited to inspire the new TU Delft students with our innovative project. We are confident that we have met the iGEM stars of the future!

Sponsors

Department of Chemical Engineering is proud to support iGEM TU Delft again this year. The Department of Chemical Engineering is one of the largest departments of TU Delft, involved in cutting edge research and responsible for several BSc and MSc programmes such as the MSc in Chemical Engineering. The Department of Chemical Engineering considers iGEM TU Delft a perfect opportunity to showcase the excellent quality and high standards of research executed by the TU Delft on an international level. This excellence is evident by the many good results and prizes previous iGEM TU Delft teams have acquired through the years!

Royal DSM is proud to sponsor iGEM TU Delft again this year! Royal DSM is a global science-based company active in health, nutrition and materials. By connecting its unique competences in life sciences and materials sciences DSM is driving economic prosperity, environmental progress and social advances to create sustainable value for all stakeholders simultaneously.

Team:TUDelft/mail/september