22nd May, 2022: The formation of the new iGEM team of IISER Berhampur

26th May, 2022: Had a team meeting with the mentors.

28th May, 2022: Team elections about the sub leaders and leaders took place.

5th June, 2022: The first collaboration meeting with the IISER Tirupati team was held on the topic of possible wet lab collaboration and Human practices.

11th June, 2022: start of the social media presence of iGEM IISER Berhampur

16th June, 2022: Team meeting regarding the whole cell SELEX and ligand-based SELEX

17th June, 2022:

• Posting our logos in the social media platforms
• Wet lab got instructions from the ug lab about the lab instructor about e coli
• The team met Dr Blessy regarding the talk on 24th June and also verified the question in the students awareness survey.

20th June, 2022: Posting out the student awareness survey to multiple parts of India and across the world

21st June, 2022: Collaboration meeting with IISER Mohali Team regarding the wetlab and modeling prospects.

24th June, 2022: Talk conducted inside the campus by our medical officer Dr. Blessy about the basics and clinical aspects of UTI.

29 June, 2022: Collaboration meeting with NU Kazakhstan regarding Synthetic Biology Art, MAWS, Biosecurity-based advice and spreading the team’s surveys with our local population.

30th June, 2022:

1. Talk conducted by Dr. R M Anjana about diabetes and its association with UTI. which was an open talk in online format.
2. Meeting with the Director of our Institute, Dr. K V R Chary, to pitch our project and the logistics regarding the funding, future prospects and outreach. He suggested for us to go and visit local villages to do the groundwork and understand the prevalence of Urinary Tract Infections amongst the villagers.

1st July, 2022: Collaboration meeting with Rochester University regarding the possibility of aptamer-based modeling support.

1st, 2nd and 3rd July, 2022: Summer Boot Camp attended by three members of the team.

5th July, 2022: Meeting with Dr. Swapnil Sinha, regarding the industrial scaling up of the project.

12th July, 2022: We started our meme making competition to increase awareness amongst the youth about Urinary Tract Infections.

24th, 25th and 26th July, 2022: All India iGEM meeting (AIIM) was held in IISc bangalore. Two team members, one from the Wetlab team and one from Modeling, attended.

31st July, 2022: Meeting with ICT Mumbai regarding wet lab , modelling and human practices collaboration.

2nd August, 2022: Phone conversation with Dr. Narendra Chirmule (PhD, Co-founder of SymphonyTech Biologics) regarding Sponsors and Investment in our project. Very enlightening conversation regarding Intellectual Property Rights and the possibility of scaling-up our project in the industry.

4th August, 2022: Zoom meeting with Dr. Vasan Sambandamurthy regarding how to pitch our project and had further conversations on how to choose aptamers for our project and what kind of SELEX would be suitable.

5th August, 2022: Obtained Permission from lab, planned out and prepared to work on experiments.

8th August, 2022: Prepared three heat maps regarding Incidence, Prevalence and Deaths of Urinary Tract Infections in 176 countries all over the globe.

10th August, 2022: Preparation of LB Broth.

11th August, 2022: Inoculation of pET28+ in LB for growth for incubation of 16 hours.

12th August, 2022: Plasmid isolation using alkaline lysis and nanopore quantification.

13th August, 2022: Preparation of gel electrophoresis buffers and arrangement of setup.

14th August, 2022: Gel electrophoresis run and visualisation of bands.

15th August, 2022: Discussion on troubleshooting for the next experiment.

17th August, 2022: LB broth inoculation and incubation for 16 hours.

18th August, 2022: Plasmid isolation using Promega kit.

19th August, 2022: Gel electrophoresis run and visualisation.

19th August, 2022: The team requested the help of Mr. Madan Mohan Padhy and Ms. Usha Kiran Sahoo (3rd Year major in Biological Sciences from IISER Berhampur) for their expertise in Odia so that we can communicate with the villagers with ease.

20th August, 2022: We took the Director sir’s advice and visited four villages, Laudigaum, Solabindha, Kirtipur and Keluapalli. We conducted a survey on the symptoms of UTI and its treatment by the local PHCs.

21st August, 2022: Troubleshooting discussion of Promega plasmid kit isolation.

22nd August, 2022: Plasmid isolation with Promega kit with modifications and optimisation in inoculation media and incubation time.

23rd August, 2022: Plasmid isolation with promega kit and nanopore quantification.

24th August, 2022: Repetition of the same experiment to replicate the result. Need for more optimisation.

25th August, 2022: We presented our project to our director and he offered to help us fund the Grand Jamboree registration. He also offered to reach out to L&T on our behalf to present our project and help us in building toilets in the villages.

25th August, 2022: We presented our project to our director.

26th August, 2022: Discussion on further optimisation.

26th August, 2022: Started recording our video for the Promotional Video.

27th August, 2022: Plasmid isolation using QIAGEN kit.

28th August, 2022: Compiled the presentation slides and animations for the Promotion Video.

30th August, 2022: Verified our promotion video with the PI and mentors. Paid the Registration fee for Grand jamboree.

31st August, 2022: Submitted our logo for the Grand Jamboree.

2nd September, 2022: Gel run for quality check and visualisation of bands. Found the optimised result.

2nd September, 2022: Submitted our Promotional Video.

5th September, 2022: Primers and FimH fragment resuspension and PCR.

6th September, 2022:

• Meet with IISER TVM, IIT Roorkee and IISER Tirupati to decide the topics of the talks.
• Gel electrophoresis of PCR mixture and visualisation.

7th September, 2022: Gel extraction and digestion of FimH insert and plasmid.

8th September, 2022: Gel run and visualisation of results. Gel extraction and ligation were performed.

9th September, 2022: Gel run and visualisation of ligation. Transformation was performed.

10th September, 2022: Wetlab discussion on optimisation on handling errors of cloning experiment and repetition of cloning.

16th September, 2022: Meet with IISER TVM, IIT Roorkee and IISER Tirupati regarding the logistics of the Women’s Health Talk Series

23rd September, 2022: We requested Dr. Indira Palo to be our speaker for the We-Talk series.

30th September, 2022: Preliminary Judging Form Freeze.

1st October, 2022: We-Talk series commences. Interview with Dr. Manjiri Bakre, CEO and Founder of OncoStem Diagnostics, on behalf of IISER TVM. IISER Tirupati conducted an informative quiz.

2nd October, 2022:

• Dr. Indira Palo, Gynaecologist and Obstetrician from MKCG Hospital, Berhampur, on behalf of IISER Berhampur, gave a talk on Menstrual Hygiene and Challenges faced by Adolescent girls.
• Dr. Prerna Lakhwani, Senior Gynecologic Oncologist, Fortis hospital, Delhi, on behalf of IIT Roorkee, gave a talk on Cervical and Breast Cancer.
• We also had a meeting with IISER TVM to discuss regarding the educational awareness initiative pertaining to Synthetic Biology.

3rd October, 2022: We had a panel discussion with the four teams collaborating on the We-talk Series.

4th and 5th October, 2022: We visited local schools and conducted fun games related to synthetic biology.

4th October, 2022: Primers and FimH fragment resuspension and PCR.

5th October, 2022: Gel electrophoresis of PCR mixture and visualisation.

6th October, 2022: Gel extraction and digestion followed by gel electrophoresis and visualisation.

7th October, 2022: Gel extraction and ligation. Incubation for 16 hours.

8th October, 2022: Transformation of ligated product. Incubation for 14 hours.

9th October, 2022: Observation of plates. Screening of colonies using colony PCR.

10th October, 2022: Purification using Ni-NTA kit.

11th October, 2022: Dialysis of purified protein. Preparation of PAGE.

12th October, 2022: Wiki Freeze and Judging Form freeze.