Our team considered this question from the beginning, starting with the choice of our project. We wished to broaden the spectrum of therapeutics to include rarer diseases. With LNPAcker we created a device which can be used to easily and quickly load siRNA into liposomes, which facilitates the development of orphan drugs. And for our therapeutic, we looked into highly prevalent diseases and discovered that herpes has a prevalence of over 66% in the world population (James, C., et al., 2020). Usually, people associate herpes with blisters on the lips but few know that a herpes simplex virus (HSV) infection can affect the brain, thus causing life-threatening encephalitis. However, there exists no specific treatment for encephalitis yet.
We asked ourselves which voices are heard in science and which are unheard. We realised through our talk with science communicator Philipp Schrögel that usually, science communication events are at universities or other scientific institutions. Therefore, most attendees already have a scientific background, and many people from the general public don’t get notified about the event. This creates the perception that the opinion of the public is not valued by the science community, creating a barrier. We made an effort to hear the voices of the public, including people who would not attend science functions. To be able to talk with any person we chose the most open physical space we knew of: the pedestrian zone. We built a booth on synthetic biology on the main street so anyone could come by and ask questions or even conduct their own experiment on isolating DNA out of a banana. This way we were able to come into contact with people of all ages, nationalities and opinions on synthetic biology. (Find out more on our Human Practices Education & Communication page!)
As some of our members are part of the mental health initiative of the major “Molecular Biotechnology” at the University
of Heidelberg, we know of the struggles students face in the STEM majors. Thus, we quickly decided that we wanted to
contribute to making science more accessible to people with mental disorders.
Each year more than a quarter of the adult population in Germany suffers from at least one psychological disorder
(German Association for Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, 2022).
The most common psychological disorders include anxiety, depression and disorders caused by alcohol and drug consumption.
Especially after the Covid pandemic, the mental health of the general population declined
(Hossain, M. M., 2020). It is now more important than ever to have functional structures
for mental care and implement solutions to include people with psychological disorders.
Since there is still a lot of stigmatisation of psychological disorders in Germany, disclosure of mental issues is rare. To estimate the number of affected students at our university, we conducted an anonymous survey. Within it, we asked about the mental wellbeing of the students, the limitations they might face due to their mental state and what kind of changes and offers could help them. In addition to the questions for every student we prepared questions solely addressed to the science students’ opinion on scientific research and how accessible it is.
Almost 150 students from different study areas filled out the survey, out of which a quarter already had a diagnosis for a psychological disorder and another quarter assumed to have one. The most common disorders were depression and anxiety. The biggest external struggles for students with mental health issues are pressure to perform, workload, financial worries and stigmatisation.
More than three quarters of all students stated that they work over 40h a week, with over 20% investing more than 60h a week into their studies (Figure 1). In contrast, almost half of these wish to work only between 35 and 45h per week (Figure 2). Moreover, 75% of the students indicate that their studies are very stressful (Figure 3), while 45% even assessed their risk for a burnout as very high (Figure 4).
To implement solutions we collaborated with the “MoBi Mental Health Team” of our university. So far we have already planned workshops which deal with the topic on how to manage stress, an online safe space for everyone to exchange about mental health struggles. Additionally, we will cooperate with the university to offer rooms in the university as places of retreat and for relaxation and create educational material on mental health and psychological disorders to fight against stigmatisation. Furthermore, we will discuss with the student council about the overwhelming amount of workload students’ mental health are suffering under. As we have learned in the workshop “Awareness about neurodivergence” by the iGEM Diversity and Inclusion Committee, solutions can be divided into ‘medical model of disability’, wherein individuals are urged to adapt to neurotypical behaviour, and social model of disability’, wherein the system is made to be more inclusive and accessible. Unfortunately, the medical model of disability is still more often used, instead of changing the working environment accepting the differences and making adjustments.
Furthermore, it was important to us to take care of our members’ mental health. In our weekly group meetings we put emphasis on asking each member at the beginning how they felt and making adjustments accordingly. We compared and adjusted the expectations of each member and everyone was able to choose their preferred working hours and tasks. Moreover, getting to know each other was very important to us, since a team can only function as such if one knows how to best interact with each other. Like that we would often cook together or do some athletic activities, e.g. play Spikeball or go bouldering.
You can find a helpful guide on how to preserve your mental health as a researcher here: Protecting your mental health: A practical guide for postgraduate research students in STEM
Our mental health poll also included several questions regarding the mindset in the scientific and research community. Since at least 23% of the participants indicated that they want to be part of the science research field in the future and another 50% still were unsure about it, we decided to dig deeper finding the reason why some people refuse to choose this career and others don’t. On the one hand, many people discover their passion for science through working in the research and development section. The curiosity-driven solving of scientific issues, the fascination about what our environment, nature and body is capable of and how we can use this to improve technologies, medical treatments and much more can be thrilling. On the other hand, people in this field can often feel a lot of pressure caused by time restricted deadlines, competition, and unlimited working hours. This reflected in our poll when asking the participants about the aspects why they decided to avoid the research section or are unsure about it.
More than 50% of them stated that they are afraid of the lacking job security as well as the uneven work-life-balance and possible little income. This is a reaction on many young scientists in Germany knowing that the work contracts in the academical research section are often temporary and permanent positions are very rare. In an additional block we asked for their personal opinion on improvement potential in the academical research. The two main aspects listed included the longing for flexible working hours without negative consequences on one’s position within the research group and a reduction of the pressure regarding the publication number. As mentioned before the work contracts are often temporary which increases the competition and pressure on publishing papers. Only through publications the research can be financed by sponsors.