Mini-Jamboree held with Concordia and McGill
Summary
This jamboree offered teams a chance to practice their presentations and receive real judging feedback. Over a two day period, teams were able to hear other groups’ presentations, present their own work, and complete fun bonding games (such as trivia, scavenger hunt, etc). The format of this jamboree was hybrid, with Canadian teams joining in-person at the Concordia campus while North American teams joined virtually. The event included workshops, talks from industry leaders, project pitching sessions, and judge feedback.
In-person meet-up with University of Rochester
Summary
The students of the University of Rochester iGEM drove up to Cornell to tour our lab, conduct an outreach event, and meet our team! When the team arrived, they toured our lab facility, our product development workspace, and the campus. Afterwards, the teams enjoyed ice cream at the dairy bar to further our social collaboration. In addition to the in-person meetup, we exchanged materials and experimental procedures. In performing experiments used to validate hypotheses about our respective projects, it would be useful to see if one group could replicate the results of the other. In addition to replicability trials, it would also be interesting to share parts among the groups. The Rochester team gave the Cornell team csgA parts and bacterial colony sharing, whereas the Cornell team offered the Rochester team hydrogel materials and testing.
BBBS Match Event with University of Rochester
Summary
As a continuation of our in person meet-up from the summer, University of Rochetster attended our BBBS match event. They presented an interactive activity centered around explaining how synthetically designed organisms work by using a “design your superhero bacteria” framework. Our presentations perfectly aligned, as we also presented on the background and meaning of synthetic biology.
Since we are hoping to share this technology with the public, there is always a chance of dual use. As much as possible, we will seek to standardize and regulate the materials we give or show to bio-artists and scientists. We considered keeping some steps of the process proprietary, but this creates another challenge in terms of inaccessibility of the science behind this technology. However, this may be justifiable since it is meant for safety purposes and to avoid dual use concerns.
Bacteria Book
Summary
We collaborated with the McGill, Queens, and Costa Rica iGEM teams to create BIOME, a bacterial picture book. This book is geared toward all audiences, and features drawings and descriptions of the favorite bacteria used by several iGEM teams across the world. We obtained responses about favorite bacteria through a Google Form from many iGEM teams, and compiled the information we received. We helped curate the illustrations and design of this book, and the McGill team actually got several copies of the book printed to bring along to the Jamboree!
CCA Mentorship
Summary
Our Product Development subteam worked with CCA iGEM in order to aid in the progress of their project, specifically on the bioreactor that they are building this year. Our first meeting with CCA iGEM was on July 7th, during which we introduced both of our projects and discussed how this collaboration will be moving forward. We decided the best course of action was to provide assistance and advice on the CCA’s bioreactor that they are building. Our next meeting was on July 17th. During this meeting, we walked the CCA Modeling Subteam through the Arduino code for our bioreactor. Throughout this, CCA members asked questions that popped up and the Product Development subteam answered in detail. Additionally, we shared a document containing our bioreactor code with them for reference when they are putting their parts together. On August 14th, we had another meeting where we updated each other with current project progress. Then, we answered questions regarding electrical component setup of the bioreactor and discussed the grading rubrics for Best Software together.
iGEM ABOA Emoji Challenge
Summary
iGEM ABOA developed the iGEM Emoji Challenge to celebrate World Emoji Day on July 17th. They prompted iGEM teams to submit custom designed emojis that represent their project topics, and Cornell iGEM submitted our very own to represent MicroMurals.
Patras DNA Day
Summary
The Patras Medicine iGEM Team created a collaboration across many iGEM teams to celebrate World DNA Day. They prompted iGEM teams to submit images of members with bases of DNA to create our very own DNA strand with all the members!
