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iGEM Team Aachen 2017

Click on the images to gather information on our work with politicians, industry, society and students.

Politics

We regard an iGEM Project to be successful when being influenced by external people and influencing our fellow men and women with our ideas. We did this by educating students on synthetic biology, developing our project with the input of researchers and industries and distributing discussions on water scarcity as a serious issue with everyone we cooperated with. But, when thinking about the possible realization and impact of a project, one has to keep in mind politicians as the people deciding environmental actions when elected. Therefore, when impacting people with our ideas, it is in our eyes necessary to talk to politicians about environmental issues and innovative ideas and political questions that arise while talking to people cooperating with us.

During our project, we got a lot of input from students, industries, and researchers on political environmental issues. With these information, we confronted Northrhine-Westfalian politicians working in the committees of environment and education to talk about concrete actions and issues of German policy on environmental action and biological education.

Andre Stinka, SPD, (source: spd.de)

Our interview partners were from three different German parties, ranging from the middle-left to the right end of the political landscape. We thank them for talking to us about the theoretical political implementation of an innovative iGEM project like ours.

The full interviews can be found here: Andre Stinka and Mr. Riegert - Dr. Christian Blex

With Andre Stinka and Mr Riegert we talked about European wastewater protection and the difficulties in Germany meeting these regulations. This included political questions to decide between protecting the environment, securing the citizens from having to pay more money and securing employment. Additionally we talked about the implementation of genetic engineering in society and typical problems environmental politicians are facing due to low societal debate and interest into environmental actions.

With Dr Christian Belx we talked about the implementation of genetic engineering in society in future. Additionally, we talked about climate change in general and the necessity of rationally thought political environmental action, where Dr. Blex stands for a conservative point of view of not acting before something is completely proven.

Dr. Patricia Peill is the head of the Northrhine-Westfalian comitee for environment. She discussed the possibility of an open dialogue about green genetic engineering with us. In her point of view it is necessary to talk about this topic, the negative but also the positive aspects.

She invited us to join an open panel on this topic to give us the possibility to address the public with our arguments.

Dr. Christian Blex,
(source: waf-afd.de)

Dr. Patricia Peill, (source: patriciapeill.de)

With Kristin Korte, head of the comitte of education in Northrhine-Westafalia, we talked about the current situation of education in Northrhine-Westafalia and reasons for the lack of knowledge about genetic engineering in schools. We discussed possible ways to implement this into biology classes, ending with updating curricula and obligating further education of teachers by law.

Kirstin Korte, (source: nw.de)

For detailed information on the interviews we have held and how they have impacted our project development visit our Integrated Human Practices | Shaping Politics

Events

While working on our project we have attended several events to get in contact with external industrials, researchers, and students. We strive for these events because of the exchange with people from different backgrounds. The information we gathered influenced the way we worked and thought on issues regarding our project. Hopefully, we could achieve this for other iGEM teams as well, by talking to them and attending their events.

We attended the following events:

SynBioDay Duesseldorf - October 2017

We were thrilled to attend the SynBio Day, an event launched by the iGEM Team Duesseldorf-Cologne to discuss current progress in synthetic biology and create a dialogue between research and public. Part of this event were talks on ethical questions of synthetic biology, talks about synthetic biology in general and info booths by several European iGEM Teams. We took this chance and presented our progress with a talk, discussed upcoming questions at our info booth and listened to interesting talks. As the Jülich Biotech Day was, the SynBio Day was an important event for us to finalize our work in the last weeks of our project. Additionally, with the presence of many iGEM Teams, we could discuss our work with these and spread the understanding of iGEM to the public.

Labvolution | Biotechnica – May 2017

Labvolution and Biotechnica are currently the biggest biotechnical fairs in Germany, taking place annually in May in Hannover, Lower Saxony. We took the chance to talk with companies supporting us already about our early plans and got in contact with companies working in the biotech sector. It was important for us to find supporters and get helpful feedback on our project idea at an early stage of our project.

Fig.1: Fabian talking to a student at the SynBioDay in Duesseldorf

Jülich Biotech Days - October 2017

Once a year a research campus, located in Jülich, close to Aachen, hosts Biotech Days, an event, where researchers from all over the world focusing on biotechnology gather to exchange knowledge and progress. In this year, the Biotech Day celebrated its 40th birthday. We had the chance to listen to highly interesting talks and discuss our project and iGEM with these researchers at our info booth. The questions which were asked and the information we got helped us to finalize our project in the last weeks.

Fig.2: Our team members Nora and Milan at the poster session at the Jülich Biotech Days

Over the summer, we attended several other events and meet-ups hosted by other iGEM teams. Read about our experiences there on our Collaborations page.

Impact

Is what we are working on worth it? Do external people understand what we want to achieve? Is there a social need for biological wastewater treatment? We asked ourselves these questions concerning our project. We came up with a survey we gave to mostly students, but our interview partners as well. The answers give an insight into the social impact of an environmental project as we have been working on.

Around 100 people from different age groups, mainly between 15 and 17, participated in our survey:

Most of the students were not focusing on a certain job yet. Additionally, we asked students from "Youth Researches", who are in parts older and have more technical experience and our interview partners from the Water Association Eifel-Rur and the Institute for sanitary environmental engineering. We asked our participants questions on their opinion on the scarcity of water worldwide nowadays and in 15 years and in Germany nowadays. Additionally, we asked for the acceptance of genetic engineering in general and with regards to our project idea and the cleanness of Germany's rivers and freshwater from the tap.

We devided our survey in different aspects. Click "read more" to get the results:

1st

The surveys done with high school students showed that there is an apparently low knowledge on genetic engineering and wastewater treatment. For more information, see Integrated Human Practices | Education

2nd

Do students and researchers consider water scarcity worldwide and in as a serious issue? Do they think the issue will be more serious in 15 years?

3rd

How is the quality of water considered to be in Germany? We asked our participants, how they would rate water scarcity in Germany and how clean they consider our rivers and tap water to be.

4th

With these results on water quality, we gave our participants a short introduction into the current situation of the Werra. The introducing text was: „The river Werra carries Chloride with a concentration of 2,5g/l, 10 times the current threshold value for drinking water.”

5th

Genetic Engineering has got a mixed reputation in Germany, however, it is mostly ill-reputed, especially green biotechnology, whereas medical biotechnology is uprated in comparison. We asked ourselves how do our participants rate genetic engineering and how do they rate it when genetic engineering is integrated into wastewater treatment plants for environmental action as we are doing it. After rating genetic engineering in general, we provided them with the following text and asked them to rate genetic engineering in this context as well: “With our idea, we aim to separate water from salt ions in for example wastewater treatment plants with the help of genetically modified organisms and therefore desalinate it.”

Education

We consider education as probably the most important thing to achieve progress in future. Therefore, we visited several classes in two schools, located in Northrhine-Westfalia, to talk about synthetic biology, to give the students a better understanding of synthetic biology and our work, and, probably the most important part, show them possibilities for their further way. Talking about iGEM and innovative ideas developed eventually influences students to think about things in another way.

To achieve this goal, we decided not only to talk to students about synthetic biology but to include them in our project. The approach included to give the students an introduction to synthetic biology and show them fields of application, discussions about the necessity of action on water treatment and the execution of experiments which were in parts related to our project. Many iGEM Teams visit schools during their projects and we highly appreciate that, but we asked ourselves how we can have the biggest impact for both us and the students we visit. We answered this question by:

Fig.1:Two of our team members with a school class integrated into our project and learning about synthetic biology

1st: Integrating the students directly into our project development

The students were part of a survey we distributed to many people we cooperated with. We wanted to know from the students how they think about genetic engineering, water availability and our approach to wastewater treatment. For detailed information and results see Impact

2nd: Performing experiments that relate directly to our project

We think that you learn the most when you are directly related to a certain kind of project. To show the students that synthetic biology, seeming to be a technology which is far away from realization, is actually possible to do in their classroom, we designed primers using the gene editing software Geneious and performed experiments to amplify a gene fragment via PCR we will utilize for genomic integration later on with the students. We chose this kind of experiment because it is possible to perform it outside of a security level 1 lab. Gene amplification emerged therefore as the best experiment to accomplish both including the students and safety of the experiments at once. In addition, we performed experiments with the students to isolate microorganisms from their environment, making agar-media, breeding the strains and microscoping them for determination.

Fig.2:Gerolamo advising students on how to use a pipette

Fig.3:The results of the firt lab day of the students

The cooperation with schools included the Marien-Gymnasium in Werl, Northrhine-Westfalia where we visited a biology advanced courses for two days (students aged 16-17) and two 10th classes (students aged 15-16) of the comprehensive school in Herzogenrath, Northrhine-Westfalia for three periods each. While performing the experiments to amplify a gene fragments with the advanced course in Werl, we worked on isolating microorganisms with the younger and yet not advanced courses in Herzogenrath to meet the state of knowledge of our students.

Fig:4:Gerolamo and Henri at the comprehensive school in Herzogenrath talking about synthetic biology and given practical advise

Fig.5:The newspaer "Soester Anzeiger" writing about our project at the Mariengymnasium Werl

Biosafety

Throughout our project development, it was important for us to guarantee a high standard of safety at all stages. Therefore, we strived to get input from our cooperation partners on safety issues in our laboratories and on the application of desalinating yeast. Amongst others, with this information, we worked on safety issues regarding:

1st

Avoidance of the release of modified cells.

Overall conversations, from water treatment plants to politicians, there was the consensus that an environmental project working with genetically modified yeast must be proof of releasing the cells.

As soon as the possibility of being discharged into the environment exists, one has to see the project very critically Dr. Brands, WVER

Membrane module for ultrafiltration used for small scale proof ouf our concept

Together with our cooperation partners we discussed this issue and worked on possible solutions. The result is an application of a membrane system (Ultra-Filtration) to hold back the cells comparatively energy-efficient and guarantees a high standard of separation. A cooperation with General Electric (GE) Energy, made it possible to prove this system in a small scale with an ultra-filtration membrane module.

Container with ampicillin

2nd

Avoidance of Antibiotic Resistance.

In our laboratories, we worked with antibiotic resistance markers to select positive strains. However, the massive release of antibiotics worldwide leads to a growing number of antibiotic-resistant strains. Our cooperation partners asked us about this issue and how we want to solve it with regards to biosafety of our yeast.

A discussion that is being conducted is the question of whether an increased release of such resistances into the environment takes place where the sewage treatment plant runs into the water. And the spread of these [antibiotic resistances] is the point of criticism. Dr. Jörrens, WVER

Laboratories are not the causers of the current problems, but a genetically modified yeast, carrying antibiotic resistance genes in an environmental application must be seen critically. We tackled this by assuring that our mutated genes do not carry antibiotic resistances, either by using auxotrophy markers or deleting the corresponding genes.

In addition, we went into dialogue with our cooperation partners regarding the comparatively bad reputation of genetic engineering in Germany. Discussions showed that the main reason for this is the fear of release of genetically modified organisms, which would destroy our environment as it occurs now.

Three of our team members at a talk about Biosafety with Mr. Stinka

But you cannot guarantee that there is no spreading. [...] This is also one of the reasons why free-field technology is not tolerated, at least in Germany, or practically not. [...] Not everything that is feasible within a system as complex as nature has to be done. Mr Riegert, consultant of the SPD

Our aim to provide ways to prove that a release into the environment is not inevitable is in this regard even more important. Additionally, we considered the low reputation of genetic engineering in the section Impact HIER LINK EINFÜGEN.

More information on our safety work and the three points mentioned above (Release, Antibiotics, and Dialogue), including actions not directly related to Human Practices, can be found on our Safety Page.

Youth Researches

Youth Researches is a scientific competition for German high school or university students, not bordered by Biology, but focusing on different sciences. We presented our project idea to these students, all of them focusing on a scientific and research background.

Around 20 students followed our invitation to our research campus in the beginning of June. We held a presentation on our project, answered many questions and guided the students around our lab space. To talk to students who are interested in scientific questions and work on research projects on their own was highly interesting for us. First, critical questions always help while developing a project, secondly, we hope that we have given them an understanding of synthetic biology, eventually influencing their prospective plans.

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