We will develop a system for the shuffling and substitution of BTEX degrading genes in a synthetic cluster to discover the most efficient combination of genes. Future teams can build on this by adding new genes to the system. In the future, iGEM teams would be able to explore the addition or substitution of BTEX degradation genes from other organisms. These could be organisms with known degradation pathways such as Pseudomonas putida or other organisms with novel degradation pathways. This work allows for further investigation towards a more efficient and beneficial method of BTEX degradation.
Our team has also developed an empty biosensor construct that can be built upon by future teams to detect new compounds and metabolites.