| Competition Deliverables |
We have completed all of the required deliverables for the 2022 iGEM competition.
You are
currently looking at our wiki, our presentation video is submitted to the video
universe,
and our judging form was completed. |
| Attributions |
Our wiki attribution page clearly shows the roles played by our team members in the
project,
with a clear and harmonious division of labor, and a more detailed description of
personal
information in the team members page. In addition, experts and scholars such as
Yuling Lin,
Zhongxiong Lai, and Longtao Zhang provided us with suggestions on experimental
design and
modifications. The advice of Dr. Chao Chen from the Department of Neurology, Jinshan
Hospital, Fujian Province, helped us to establish the commercial goal of the
experiment to
successfully serve the insomnia population. The patient explanations from Fuqing
experts
such as Weiping Zheng and Zuxing Yu helped us to continuously modify and improve our
program
to solve local problems for local people. Therefore, we believe that our project
attribution
meets the criteria of this section. |
| Description |
People in today's society are often plagued by insomnia and anxiety. We found that
GABA can
improve human sleep quality, lower blood pressure and relieve anxiety, and longan
has both
calming effects and high GABA content, so we decided to use synthetic biology and
molecular
biology as core tools to screen key genes in the GABA synthesis pathway and improve
GABA
content in longan embryonic healing tissues by constructing overexpression vectors
and
CRISPR- Cas9 technology to enhance the GABA content in longan embryonic healing
tissues.
Subsequently, we will further increase GABA content by blue light and
high-temperature
treatment to create high-yield GABA cell factories and collaborate with related
companies to
extract GABA and use it in the pharmaceutical industry for therapeutic purposes. We
also
found two iGEM teams doing GABA-related projects, which strengthens our
determination, and
we believe the above meets this criteria. |
| Contribution |
In terms of components, based on the three-generation genomic database of longan in
our team
lab, we uploaded the related components of GAD and CaM, the key genes of the GABA
synthesis
pathway in longan, as well as plasmid vector components; in the part of human practice, we
successfully established a complete local protocol for the first time, which can
help future
teams to form their unique local protocols. In addition, our bioreactors made from
longan
cells can be applied to other plants, thus expanding the source of GABA and
contributing to
the biomedical industry.We believe our team fully meets this criteria. |
| Engineering Success |
Our project was carried out strictly according to the "design-build-test-learn"
sequence,
during which we successfully modified one basic part and synthesized four composite
parts,
two of which could not be published in the parts due to the confidentiality
agreement, and
we achieved a successful project through multiple approaches such as endogenous gene
modification and exogenous condition changes to enhance GABA, and verified the
correctness
of the modification by GABA content measurement.We believe the above meets this
criteria.
|
| Collaborations |
We have close communication with XMU-China, FAFU, ShanghaiTech and BUCT-China teams.
We
cooperated with the FAFU team of the same university to carry out human practice
activities.
We provided practice opportunities for the FAFU team and actively connected with
various
social groups. The publicity experience of the FAFU team helped us to better improve
the
activity planning. We also shared our modeling experience with the XMU-CHINA team
and hosted
an iGEM gathering event with the ZJU-CHINA team. As one of the organizers, we also
held a
joint science popularization activity of synthetic biology with ShanghaiTech and
BUCT-China
team. We then had a valuable opportunity to work together with teams from
universities and
colleges to produce a survey of recurrent deficiencies in our ranks, which can be
viewed
together at Partnership.We believe the above meets this criteria. |
| Human Practices |
In order to apply the results of human practice to experimental design and feedback
the
experimental results into human practice, we have done a lot of interesting and
innovative
activities. We have collected questionnaires, conducted large-scale science
popularization
in high schools and kindergartens, joint university conferences, and participated in
national academic conferences, etc. Through these external interactions, we
constantly
reflected and tailored the plans of our projects. We also focus innovatively on the
practices of locals solving local problems. We selected the "Fuqing Longan Township"
suitable for the project, and established a complete solution to the Fuqing problem
through
experiments, biostatistics, modeling, in-depth and extensive visits. It is worth
mentioning
that we also focus on applying the results to industrial transformation. We
completed
detailed and scientific business planning and initial production of products, and
participated in various entrepreneurial competitions to improve the plan.We believe
that our
project meets this criterion.
|
| Proposed Implementation
|
Our target users are mainly patients with insomnia and depression. Our project will
eventually produce high GABA cell lines and extract GABA for application in the
pharmaceutical industry, where patients can consume GABA to help sleep and calm
their mind
and relieve anxiety, and we have promoted our project to local farmers in applying
local
people to solve local problems, and in the future, we expect to apply synthetic
biology to
agricultural practices to develop branded high-end agriculture, in addition, we
expect to
use GABA in food processing to produce derivative products such as longan beverage,
longan
cream, and longan cooling oil. However, there will be some challenges in
application, such
as whether GABA extracted from longan healing tissues can be safely ingested by
human body,
and the amount of intake, how to put into production to expand culture, and people's
recognition of gene editing products will be issues we need to consider carefully.We
believe
our project meets this criterion. |
| Integrated Human
Practices |
On our integrated human practice website, we have detailed the help of practical
activities
in each stage to our project in the form of a timeline. We established the goal of
our
project and constantly adjusted our experimental design by visiting and
investigating
farmers, government, market and experts. After that, we established an exact
solution to the
problem based on the survey. Details can be found on our local solution page. We
have
successfully established the first research, then designed the scheme, and then
gradually
implemented the scheme. Finally, we can further drive the benefits of the scheme
through the
spreading power of news reports, and truly achieve the closed-loop of human
practice.
|
| Project Modeling |
In the modeling process based on the experimental group data, first, we build Enzyme
Kinetic
model to assist us to understand the designed experiments. After the experiments
were
completed, we successfully fitted the data results of the experiments with the
improved PSO
algorithm to help us understand the direction of the experimental data changes.
Then, the
Machine Learning technique helped us to predict the experiments that could not be
realized
due to practical reasons. At the end, we used the SA-PP-TOPSIS model to select the
site for
the longan factory.
The model originates from the project and the model serves the project. Our model
aims to
predict the change of GABA content in longan after treatment, which describes and
extends
the results of the experimental group in a comprehensive way and serves as a good
prospect
for the future production of GABA-related products.
|
| Proof of Concept |
In our project, based on the basic response of GABA production in longan healing
tissues, we
screened two genes of the related pathway, GAD and CaM. we overexpressed GAD in
longan using
the pCAMBIA-1301 plasmid and knocked out CaM using the pGW3 plasmid, thereby
increasing the
GABA content in longan healing GABA content in the tissues. Nowadays, insomnia and
various
depressive moods plague people and affect their daily life. The high GABA cell line
created
by our team was expanded and cultured using fermenters to build a plant cell factory
to
extract GABA in collaboration with related companies to help solve insomnia and mood
disturbances.
|
| Partnership |
Throughout the season, we have reached a long-term and in-depth cooperation with the
FAFU
team. This cooperation is a win-win situation. It not only helped us share various
opportunities of science popularization outreach, reflection and improvement, but
also
enabled us to learn from each other's strengths, improved together. We not only
innovated
the new science form of synthetic biology orienteering, but also successfully
completed the
children's science section together. In addition, we kept communicating with each
other for
a long time and asked each other about the project progress. Especially, the trip to
Xiamen
University helped us realize the problems existing in team mode, the combination of
human
practice and experiment, and the combination of modeling and experiment, which
timely helped
us adjust the direction of our efforts in all parts. |
Education and
Communication |
Partnership and local practices provided many possible approaches to synthetic biology
outreach,
such as joint science communication among universities, community programmes such as
kindergartens and high schools, farmers' talks, videos and articles on public platforms.
These
activities helped our target population to accept our project to a wider extent. We also
publicized our project extensively through 17 news articles and television stations. In
addition
to the success of this year's educational campaign, which brought immediate benefits to
our
target population, we also shared permanent video and text science materials for future
iGEM
teams to use. |
| Education |
Partnership and local practices provided many possible approaches to synthetic
biology
outreach, such as joint science communication among universities, community
programmes such
as kindergartens and high schools, farmers' talks, videos and articles on public
platforms.
These activities helped our target population to accept our project to a wider
extent. We
also publicized our project extensively through 17 news articles and television
stations. In
addition to the success of this year's educational campaign, which brought immediate
benefits to our target population, we also shared permanent video and text science
materials
for future iGEM teams to use.
|
| Integrated Human
Practices |
In order to apply the results of human practice to experimental design, and to feed
the
results of experiments back to human practice, we have done plenty of interesting
innovative
activities. We conducted questionnaire collection, large-scale popular science
outreach in
high schools and kindergartens, joint conference of universities, participation in
national
academic conferences, etc. We also innovatively focused on the practice of local
people
solving local problems. We chose the "Longan Township", Fuqing, which fits the
project, and
established a complete solution to Fuqing’s problem through experiments,
biostatistics,
modeling, deep and extensive visits. It is worth mentioning that we also pay
attention to
the application of the results to the industrial transformation. We complete the
detailed
and scientific business planning and initial production of products and participated
in
various entrepreneurial competitions to improve the plan. |
| Supporting
Entrepreneurship
|
In the initial process of the experiment, we also focused on how to apply technology
to life
and how to really help people. In order to achieve this goal, we have written a
detailed and
scientific business plan, which is mainly used to make plans for the follow-up
industrial
processing of our team's technology. In addition, we have successfully achieved mass
production of longan drinks as our products. |
| Model |
In the modeling process based on the experimental group data, first, we build Enzyme
Kinetic
model to assist us to understand the designed experiments. After the experiments
were
completed, we successfully fitted the data results of the experiments with the
improved PSO
algorithm to help us understand the direction of the experimental data changes.
Then, the
Machine Learning technique helped us to predict the experiments that could not be
realized
due to practical reasons. At the end, we used the SA-PP-TOPSIS model to select the
site for
the longan factory.
The model originates from the project and the model serves the project. Our model
aims to
predict the change of GABA content in longan after treatment, which describes and
extends
the results of the experimental group in a comprehensive way and serves as a good
prospect
for the future production of GABA-related products. |
| Safety and Security |
The Longan GABA drink we made conforms to the range of food additives in the Food Safety Law of the
People's Republic of China: citric acid 0.08%-0.15%, sodium citrate 0.01%-0.03%, iso-vc-na 0.05%, CMC
0.02%-0.05%, and pectin 0.02%-0.05%. We have conducted several controlled clinical trials in our drink
processing laboratory, and after several adjustments, we have strictly controlled the content of additives
and determined the range of additives that can roughly comply with food safety laws. Finally we sent the
Longan GABA drink we made to Westside Foods for testing and the results showed that the content of each
additive was within the above required range. In addition, the containers, instruments and additives we
purchased to make the drink met food-grade standards to ensure the GABA Longan refreshments are safe to
drink. In a nutshell, the maximum food safety was achieved. |
