March for Science, 22 April 2017
SCIENCE, NOT SILENCE
![Group Picture at March for Science](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/f/f3/T--TU_Dresden--marchforsciencegroup.jpeg)
Science influences very different aspects of our daily life. It is critical to health, economics, food security, and safety. Being part of an iGEM team brings us even closer in touch with what it means to be a scientist and how important the acknowledgement from public policy and society is for our work.
To celebrate and strengthen the role of science in policymaking, our iGEM team joined the March for Science in Dresden on April 22, 2017. Main goals of the march were to support evidence-based policy making, government funded research and transparency in science. The initial “Scientists March on Washington” was supported by a series of marches in more than 600 other cities all around the globe.
Our international team represents a diverse and inclusive scientific community, one of the ideals behind the march of science. Furthermore, the issue of acceptance of the consensus on climate change and evolution is something we also have strong feelings about and what is represented by our iGEM goes green initiative.
As young scientists, we walked through the baroque city center of Dresden to demonstrate what value scientific research has for our community. Scientifically proven facts should be taken more seriously in political decisions. Showing solidarity with the world wide scientific community and representing our values and interests was an impressive experience. We march forward with Science.
![Team TU Dresden with posters for March for Science.](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/9/97/T--TU_Dresden--marchforscience_poster.jpeg)
![March for Science in Dresden](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/f/f9/T--TU_Dresden--marchofscience_demo.jpeg)
Find more information here: https://www.marchforscience.com/our-mission/, 09.09.2017 https://www.marchforscience.de, 09.09.2017
iGEM goes green - Expertise
![Go green logo](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/9/93/T--TU_Dresden--gogreen_logo_withoutbackground.png)
In the beginning, we spent a lot of time investigating options and possibilities for planting trees, getting familiar with CO2 compensation as well as looking for collaboration partners and support. We got in contact with some experts in the field of sustainability and exchanged views with the existing community in order to learn how to track our GHG emissions, how to reduce them and how to share our results with the world:
Sustainability experts
Toni Kiel
Founder of plant values, a business consultancy for sustainable company development
![Toni Kiel](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/d/d7/T--TU_Dresden--GG_Expert_Toni.jpeg)
Stephan Schöps and Dr. Ines Herr
Dept. Environmental Management/ Environmental Coordination of the TU Dresden
![Stephan Schoeps](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/4/4e/T--TU_Dresden--GG_Expert_Schoeps.jpeg)
Nicole Kelesoglu
Editor and blogger of Labconscious, an open resource website for scientists in green lab initiatives
![Kerstin Hermuth-Kleinschmidt](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/5/56/T--TU_Dresden--Experts_Nicole.png)
While researching into sustainable lab work we discovered that there is already a community that shares our concern: Labconsious, an open resource supporting researchers using green lab initiatives to improve efficiency and reduce the environmental footprint of bench science supported by New England Biolabs (NEB). We followed the blog on Labconscious with interest and contacted Nicole, the editor of this webpage. She kindly offered us to publish two blog posts on her website to extend our outreach and helped us to share our “Green your lab” poster via Labconscious.
We are looking forward to meeting Nicole after the Giant Jamboree at the NEB Campus in Boston. She will interview our team and publish the story of iGEM goes green in one of her blog posts. Furthermore, the iGEM goes green initiative will be the content of an episode of NEB TV.
Dr. Kerstin Hermuth-Kleinschmidt
Founder of NIUB-Nachhaltigkeitsberatung - sustainability consulting for companies in life sciences with a focus on sustainable lab work
![Kerstin Hermuth-Kleinschmidt](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/4/40/T--TU_Dresden--GG_Expert_Kleinschmidt.jpeg)
Dr.-Ing. Annina Gritzki
Member of the interdisciplinary CAMPER project of TU Dresden, a project to analyze energy consumptions on campus and find ways to increase energy efficiency
While searching for ways to monitor our energy consumption of lab devices, we got in contact with Annina Gritzki, who seemed to be the best contact person regarding this topic. She lent us amperemeter plugs and we directly started checking the energy consumption of centrifuge and other devices. With an app, the consumption over time was monitorable which was extremely helpful for our Calculation Tool and to get an idea of our energy consumption. Furthermore, Ms Gritzki, having knowledge from similar experiments in (non-biological) labs, revised our calculator tool and gave useful suggestions for improvement.
Wilderness International
A foundation that aims at the world-wide preservation of unique wilderness areas for future generations
We cooperated with Wilderness International an environmental foundation located in Dresden to compensate for our GHG emissions. For this purpose, we donated the prize money we won in a photo contest hosted by New England Biolabs. These EUR 500 will guarantee a long-term nature conservation of another 640 m2 temperate rainforest in Canada that is endangered by the wood and mining industry. According to Wilderness International every square meter compensates for 104,79 kg CO2, so with our donation we compensate for more than 67 tons of CO2. Furthermore, they offered us to convert The iGEM Goes Green GHG Emissions Calculator into an online tool and publish it on their homepage.
See how all the feedback and expert talks have influenced our project design on our Integrated Human Practices page.
Long Night of Sciences, 16 June 2017
![LNOS](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/6/66/T--TU_Dresden--LNOS_1.jpg)
As part of giving back to the community, we hosted a booth at the Long Night of Sciences, an annually event taking place in many cities throughout Germany. We focused on introducing iGEM and synthetic biology to the public in Dresden. We tried to increase awareness of the beauty and ethics behind the things we do. To keep all ages entertained, we had Legos and gave instructions to kids on how to build BioBricks. Different colors of big bricks corresponded to different genes, like fluorescent proteins, smaller bricks corresponded to different promoters and so on.
We also offered strawberry DNA extraction, where kids could extract DNA by mashing them with their hands in bag of soap and then extracting the DNA in cold ethanol. As the children were entertained with their Legos and strawberry pounding, we presented our project in synthetic biology to their parents and all the visitors of the Long Night of Sciences. People were introduced to the latest research in biotechnology and expressed their deep interest in BioBricks and synthetic biology in general. At the end of the day, successful young scientists were able to take home a tube of strawberry DNA and parents were left in awe of newly acquired kids' skills.
Some impressions:
![LNOS](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/8/8a/T--TU_Dresden--LNOS_3.jpg)
![LNOS](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/9/93/T--TU_Dresden--LNOS_4_cut.jpg)
![LNOS](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/9/95/T--TU_Dresden--LNOS_5.jpg)
![LNOS](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/d/d6/T--TU_Dresden--LNOS_7.jpg)
Safety expertise
![Safety talk](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/f/f7/T--TU_Dresden--S_Lydiasafety.jpg)