Communication
Introduction
This iGEM season we focused on developing informative materials surrounding the uses of synthetic biology. We aimed to spread awareness on Alzheimer’s disease and Synthetic Biology. We did this through growing our social media presence and informing our audience on how we plan to treat mild to moderate symptoms of the disease in order to improve quality of life. Parallel to this the team were motivated to diversify our audience and worked on improving accessibility in STEM. This led to us spearheading the Chroma Campaign on our social media, where we encouraged other teams worldwide to participate in altering their colour schemes on various platforms in order to accommodate for colour blindness. The team also boosted their accessibility by expanding to more platforms such as a blog, podcast and educational workshops too.
We documented each step of our project, writing weekly summaries and keeping our audience updated on upcoming events, as well as curating a feed which can be read by anyone, not necessarily those with a strong scientific background and by not excluding those with visual or auditory impairments. This was all done in hopes to diversify STEM and encourage those who do not yet feel confident in the field to become inspired.
Social Media and Public Engagement
Social media has been a large part of our project from the very beginning. We started by creating an ‘ology’ series, where we explored the fields within synthetic biology and biotechnology. We aimed to set the foundations for our project and our social media presence, especially when introducing a new topic to those who had not heard of these particular branches of biology before. The team wrote small infographics relating synthetic biology to popular culture, such as Spiderman, Jurassic World and Orphan Black, in hopes to broaden our demographic past merely undergraduate and postgraduate scientists, inspiring the younger generation too.
We also wrote accessibility posts, educating the public on the hardships of the LGBTQIA+ community throughout the month of June, how queer individuals left their mark on science and how science can be diversified. All our social media posts are now colour-blind friendly and have alt-text, once again broadening our inclusivity, as well as track our engagement to see when would be the most appropriate times to post in order to grow our presence further.
As well as this, other aspects of our Instagram were more personal, following different subteams within the KCL iGEM Team. This promoted our engagement worldwide, and had the aim of encouraging future applicants for iGEM. It increased trust and transparency between the team and the audience, encouraging an open dialogue surrounding some of the hardships and wins of the competition as well as wins with thousands of viewers all over the world.
Chroma Campaign
Another value the science communication team wanted to uphold was trust and transparency with our audience. This was our main goal when introducing the Chroma Campaign. We started this campaign once we had done research and stumbled across an article that revealed the most and least advantageous colours to people with colour blindness, compromising our whole colour scheme. Instead of continuing, the team made the decision to announce the change to our colour scheme, and encouraged other teams to do the same. We then continued the campaign, documenting every step of our accessibility ideation on our social media, allowing our Instagram to become a template to creating an entirely accessible platform for other teams as well, helping the iGEM competition become more accessible than it has ever been.
Cellular Space Blog
In addition to increasing engagement through social media, the science communication team also created the Cellular Space Blog. This blog had the aim of making the latest scientific research accessible to the public, regardless of their background. Articles published on the blog ranged from bioluminescence and biodegradable COVID tests, to quantum microscopy, truly engaging with not only scientists and researchers from different STEM backgrounds, but also people with no scientific background at all as they were all written in an accessible way, with at least 40 readers per post.
This blog is also where we posted our guides. Designed specifically by the Science Communication team, these guides were created to encourage other people, as well as other teams, also interested in public engagement to show our ideation process and how we developed and grew these pages. We contributed guides for writing articles, recording podcasts, creating a blog and using Canva to optimise design and accessibility on social media.
Symemco Talks Podcast
The Symemco Talks podcast was another aspect the science communication team curated this year. This podcast hoped to explore different topics throughout synthetic biology by interviewing different iGEM Teams. Not only did this boost our collaboration as well as increase accessibility to the general public, but it also encouraged collaboration and partnerships between international teams. Podcast episodes ranged from therapeutics and diagnostics to neuroscience and bioart with special guest teams all over the world, including: LiU_Sweden, NYCU_Formosa.