Team:Hong Kong UCCKE/Description
Where did our idea come from?
1% of the World’s population suffer from gout,and it's becoming more and more prevalent. In the U.S, it affects 8.3 million of Americans. Our team’s PI’s family have been suffering from the disease for generations. As his students, and an iGEM team, we are inspired to find new detection methods and even cure for gout.
What is Gout?
Gout is a form of arthritis due to elevated levels of uric acid in the blood. At high levels, uric acid crystallizes and is accumulated at synovial fluid. This causes massive pain, and a red, tender, hot, swollen joint. The food we intake everyday contains purine, such as steak, organ meats and seafood.. . And these purines will be catalyzed by several enzymes into uric acid (as the pathway below). However, homo sapiens lacks uricase, as known as urate oxidase, which catalyzes uric acid into allantoin. Normally, uric acid dissolves in your blood and passes through your kidneys into your urine. But sometimes your body either produces too much uric acid or your kidneys excrete too little uric acid. Since uric acid has a low solubility (0.6mg/100ml) thus it crystallizes and deposits in a joint. https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/0/0d/T--Hong_Kong_UCCKE--_What_is_Gout_%28Project_description%29.png https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/e/ee/T--Hong_Kong_UCCKE--_Gout_%28Project_Description%29.png
What is Gout?
