Introduction

For education and public engagement, we had several interviews and introduced synthetic biology and our project to the public.During those activities, we contacted friends at home and abroad who have been interested in science and inspired more young kids to devote themselves to synthetic biology through simple experiments and interesting board games. Our team believes that science should be spread to all human beings.

To begin with, we held a market survey to test how the public understands the concepts of vaccines. However, we found that kids commonly couldn’t comprehend the meanings and knowledge of oral vaccines. As a result, we made a board game for them to solve this problem.

After that, we hoped to promote biotechnology to our peers who are now studying in junior high.On the occasion of the steam fair held in our school, which was composed of all science subjects and the FRC team,we introduced the junior students to experiments.We even conducted a club for junior students, in order to enhance their experimental skills and knowledge. This event also played a role in assisting us in getting acquainted with our project ideas since there was an associated science fair taking place in the National Museum of Natural Science. We had a further promotion to the crowds, especially young kids.

As a result, we discovered that kids didn’t understand much about synthetic biology. Hence, we hosted a summer camp for elementary school students. At that time, the government had just announced that children under 11 could be vaccinated. By chance, we introduced them to some basic knowledge and had some interactive courses,such as board game with fundamental vaccine facts with them.According to psychological studies, playing board games can not only bring people happiness but activate our brain and enhance its functions.So this is an effective method to help out our target audiences.It also allowed us to achieve our educational goal more efficiently.

To have a small trial in discussion of scientific projects and raise the public's awareness and engagement , we had a debate on GMO. We expected to make our plan move on more successfully with the activity.

In addition,we have begun science summits with foreign countries last year. It was the second time we had meetings with Ono High School. In the post-pandemic era, we cross the barriers of space and communicate with foreign students who have a passion for science and truth. This is the challenge of training our team to be adaptable.

Moving onto the next stage of our project, we thought SDGs were also important . Thus, we invented a board game about SDGs and invited kids to play with us. We changed their mind and urged them to make a difference to the world.During the process, we found a boy with his hearing impaired.However, since the beginning, he has been eagering to understand no matter the SDGs game or the simple experiments we brought to them. We hope to ignite their enthusiasm about these goals. We were full of joy to see that those who were interested in conducting experiments could put effort into the Earth.

Board Games with Communication

After we observed that awareness of synthetic biology among the children was low,we realized that this was due to the course arrangement in Taiwan doesn’t include so much about public health and synthetic biology.As a result, the board game was created to assist them to gain more scientific knowledge.

We brought the board game to the elementary camp and National Museum of Natural Science During the process, we also spread our ideas to people and the public who weren’t an IGEMer.Basically, Moreover, adults were also interested in our games, so we gave them instructions on how to play our board games. Both children and adults enjoyed the game a lot. By the way, since IGEM competition hasn’t been known by most people in Taiwan yet, many of the adults consulted us about what the competition was about. They generally had a basic understanding about IGEM after our communication. Some of the adults even mentioned that they would like to make their children take part in this competition in the future.We made a win-win situation for kids and adults.As for the rule, this was used to enhance Taiwan public’s awareness about vaccines, so the rules were in Chinese. Besides, we had three versions of our board game in order to match every group in our society, which were below elementary, juniors and the general public.

Board Game Rules

The Steam Fair Event at School

Last year, some of our juniors asked us questions about synthetic biology and showed great interest in it, so we decided to hold a steam fair which lasted for three days for those students who have a preference for biology and taught them to do some experiments.

On the first day, we did electrophoresis, which is a laboratory technique used to separate DNA based on their size and electrical charge. Many of the students were the first to do electrophoresis, so the strength was hard for them to control when they used the pipettes to load the GFP genes. Moreover, the voltage was also one of the keys to make the experiment succeed. On the second day, we did plasmid extraction. We used E.coli to do the experiment and did the step that adds PD3(a kind of buffer). On the last day, we taught them DNA coding, including four nitrogenous bases—A,T,C,G and the process of how DNA became proteins. In the end, we split them into a few teams to see who's the fastest to decode the sequences first and gave the winners rewards.

Not only did the students who participated in the events had learned lots of experiment skills they never knew before, we also enhanced our problem solving and communication skills. We had faced numerous problems in these three days, for instance, we didn't teach them how to use the pipette till the second day, so some of them used it in the wrong way at first. Additionally, the experiment materials weren't evenly distributed so it also caused some mess. Therefore, we have learned how to hold an event perfectly and also promote synthetic biology to the students in our school.

The Biotechnology Club for Junior Students

In order to promote an atmosphere of biological science, we spent extra time founding a club for biotechnology in our school. We invited the juniors who are interested in synthetic biology to start touching on the related concepts and experiments. Fortunately, about 30 juniors have joined our club.

We used the time after school and several weekends to train the juniors. Starting from the basis, it took us a few lessons imparting fundamental knowledge for genetic modification, folding models of the DNA double helix with paper and introducing experiment principles included. By doing so, they would be well-prepared for the experiments to come. Afterwards, we acquainted them with the equipment in our laboratory. Moreover, we operated several experiments, such as mini prep, PCR, agarose gel electrophoresis, and bacterial culture. Last but not the least, we completed a two-days experiment transferring GFP into E.coli.

By letting the juniors conduct experiments together in a group, they could directly ask questions about the problems they encountered, and we could also solve their questions immediately. From the experience of teaching them, we could also review the procedures of experiments. In addition, we learned how to explain synthetic biology in a more simple way so that it can be understood by people at all ages.

Science Fair at National Museum of Natural Science

To enhance the atmosphere of biotechnology in our school, our team is determined to take part in this event. For preparation, we had a meeting about setting up the stall one month ago. After that, we distributed the jobs to all team members, and we started to take action. We then started making the poster and gathering materials for our activities. At last, we rehearsed to make sure that nothing would go wrong during the actual event.

We mainly did two events: one is the fruit DNA extraction, and one is the ball tossing game. For the procedures of the fruit DNA extraction, people will add bananas to 95% salt water, dishwashing liquid, pineapple juice and start the extraction process. For the ball-tossing game, the audiences will toss a ball onto ball plates named according to A,T,C,G, and they’ll have to search up a chart and find the correct name of the certain protein mentioned on the plate.

During this lesson, we’ve learnt several new skills, including map reading, the ability to improvise, knowing the correct way of taking care of kids, and how to deal with problems during events.

After the event, we’ve gained experiences and some thoughts. First of all, we’ve realized how adorable and intelligent the minor audiences/kids are. After the teaching we provided, most of them understood our experiment.

Scientific Summer Camp for Elementary Kids

Compared to normal students, the educational resources for resource class students are generally insufficient, and they may not have access to fields outside ordinary curriculum such as molecular biology.Especially,these kids had low motivation for learning. We aspire that students in resource classes can also have the opportunity to achieve diversified development; hence, our team planned to teach the basics in the fields of biology and molecular biology, which we usually learned in Mingdao iGEM.

Targeting fourth and fifth-grade students, our team has designed life-oriented courses and intriguing activities in order to enhance their interests and preliminary understanding in these fields. In the end, our team hopes that the camp will have an impact on how elementary school students learn and apply their knowledge in real life. Even better, we hope that this experience will inspire students to pursue higher education in this field.

We first introduced vaccines from five aspects. Because it is a relatively boring class mode, we cooperate with videos and questions to enhance children's interest and concentration during the process. The first is the origin of the vaccine: vaccinia. Then there is the enemy we have to fight: the virus, in which we introduced "what is a virus" and "the structure of a virus". Then there is the principle of how vaccines work.

Next,we sparkled children's curiosity about DNA, cells, and extraction by asking thought-provoking questions: what is DNA? What is a cell? How do we extract DNA from a cell? Our team explained the experimental equipment, steps, and the principle of each step, and then we finally let the children complete the experiment under the condition of being very clear about the purpose of each step.

In the end,through the board games carefully designed by our iGEM team, students not only have a deeper understanding of vaccines, but also gain basic knowledge about the prevention measures and treatment of several diseases–polio, chickenpox, shingles, measles, monkeypox, etc.– that they are not usually exposed to. Moreover, skills such as addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division were necessary to complete the game; hence, the game also helped students exercise their mathematical skills frequently.

Through this camp, our team has successfully promoted molecular biology to students in resource class; with positive feedback from children, we felt that all efforts were worthwhile.

IGEM heritage conference

All IGEMers surely know that giving out our knowledge, educating the next generation and people around us has always been an important mission in IGEM.

With the end of the iGEM 2021 competition, which also symbolized that we of Mingdao iGEM in 2022 would have to inherit the great glory of the seniors to the juniors.The seniors talked about how the competition has benefited them in different aspects and how much they’ve learned, inspiring us to know more about the competition.

By participating in the event, students shall have a brief idea of how the IGEM team processes the competition. For instance, the three subunits of the group(Wet lab, Dry lab, and HP) will be divided into smaller units due to job distributions.

GM Foods Debate

Since public engagement has always been an indispensable aspect of IGEM, our team brainstormed a myriad of activities that invite our community into the splendors of synthetic biology–one of which is the scientific debate about the regulation of genetically modified food (GMO). Moreover, in order to enhance the quality of the debate, the activity was co-hosted with experienced members of the Scientific Society: a club that has held a range of activities related to science, including several debates. During the process of organizing the activity, both hosts evaluated the former rules of procedures (ROP) of the previous debates, and suggests areas of improvement. The involvement of a new community has allowed both sides to exchange insights; therefore, the collision of nobel ideas led us to come up with a revised and original set of ROP. Also, to ensure debaters’ experiences in preparing for the event, the hosts have to-write a detailed background guide that provides a comprehensive overview of the fundamentals of GMO. Hence, apart from debaters themselves, the hosts also gained a thorough understanding about the topic.

While debaters were preparing their arguments, no matter if the team was supporting or opposing the regulation of GMO, the event allowed debaters to cooperate as a whole rather than working individually, revealing the power of solid teamwork through successful collaboration within groups. Moreover, the debate structure has put participants in professional roles which consider responsibility in seeking reliable, considerable sources of information. Apart from filtering unreliable websites, the research-based debate sheet–which the hosts have assigned to debaters–has challenged people to detect and integrate usable, beneficial ideas in this era of information advancement. After days of developing, combining, and drafting, the debate session tends to be the most indispensable part of the activity. Noticeably, The atmosphere intensifies during the cross-debating session, everyone has their own significant stance that allows them to propose and question the opposing team within a limited time.

As a result, with the hard work from both Mingdao’s IGEM team and Scientific Society, the new version of ROP has indeed made a significant change, allowing more opportunities of succession for future events.

Ono High School Online Summit

In April, 2022, we had an online exchange with Japan Ono senior high school. During this session, we shared our thoughts on different topics of technology, including activities like iGEM, FRC, while they in turn told us about two physics projects they’re working on.

Through this activity, we told them the basic ideas of iGEM and how the committee works. Afterwards, our team emphasized on the different types of vaccines developed for SARS-CoV-2. Then, we started to introduce what our team is doing this year. Last but not least, our team concluded our presentation with a Q&A activity, in which they were all very kinetic and asked lots of questions about our team.

From this successful exchange, we realized that a good colloquy requires precise and simple points for both sides to understand the topic, rather than using difficult and sophisticated words. Hence, the more we understand each other’s domain, the more successful the exchange will be.

This session also boosted our abilities to teach and educate the public in English, which is an extremely valuable experience for us all, since we aim to participate in the future iGEM jamboree. Furthermore, it prompted us to sort out what we’ve done during the past few months. As a result, our view of the whole project is clearer than ever! All in all, this experience has truly broadened our horizons to an astounding degree.

SDGs and the Elementary School Camp

We considered that education can’t merely be associated with hygiene knowledge. It is also crucial to have humanistic discipline and knowledge.To hit our goal, we invited elementary students to join a one-day camp and play our board game. Our board game can effectively train and motivate them to think about the 17 goals.Although they were still young, some resolutions they came about were really feasible and creative.

We let them play our board game first. It was a game that resembled Monopoly,which generally caught children’s eyes. We merged our project concepts and ideas of vacccines in goal 3 of our game, as well as our motivation to design our product in goal 10 and 12. Children could not only deliberate for the best answers to win the game but receive the pros of oral vaccines. As for the rules and other details, go check our SDGs page.

Next, we tested them with a form, in which there were several quesions about the goals.We first introduced them with a background story about each goal and asked them a question about it. All of our questions were open-ended, some of them were argumentative.We divided them into 6 groups, each group has 5 people to discuss about the problems.

The below were their answers.

We asked about their ages,with their brain and mind developing,it may affect the answers they reply. As a result, each group consists of students with different ages. Next up, we asked them if they had known SDGs before.Half of them had the experience.They also replied they got to know SDGs. Almost everyone knowing SDGs got to know it from their teachers, social media was also a major source.

As for goal 3, we asked them about how to solve the spread of the disease in Africa since they suffer from AIDS,tuberculosis and so on.Some of them said we should send doctors and nurses to Africa and give them body checks to get rid of these pathogens. Some of them expressed that foreign countries should give them help.Amid all the groups, two groups mentioned that we should give them a shot.

This coincidentally matches our project.We told them concepts of our projects and communicated with them, which they felt fulfilling.

Goal 9 also sticks to our project.We asked them how to reduce inequality between two countries. Many groups replied that we can swallow our pride to help others in order to increase communications between them.A group replied we should make the distribution of medical resources equal so people can get help.It seemed that our board game had a quick effect on children’s minds.

Moving next, we introduced a fun experiment to kids, which was the extraction of banana’s DNA.Before the experiment, we gave them a pop quiz about it.We can see that for some elementary students, most of them had known the idea of IGEM competition and genetic engineering since they got them all correct.But when it came to problems such as “What is plasmid?” (only 50% correct) “What’s the function of alcohol in the experiments?” (only 33% correct) “How much is this pipette?” (only 16% correct),they couldn’t answer it accurately since it involved relatively advanced knowledge of biology.

We assist them with the experiment,it can make them learn in the experiment, as they have done this form and discovered the problems.After the experiments, we guided them to visit our lab.We introduced the equipment to them.This could activate their curiosity and prompt them to understand more. Inside the children, there was a boy with hearing broblems.However, he was the most vigorous one and asked us bunches of questions.We saw the ambition inside his heart, and we were also willing to help him and solve his problems.Our team hope the activity could ignite the seed in his heart, and he could made his effort on this field.

After a day of courses and activities, we also had a form for them to fill out. Analyzing the results, we found something astonishing.

We have mentioned that only half of the students had heard of SDGs, but now there were 80% of the students who would like to promote the goals

When we asked how they would promote the goals, they came up with many ways.For instance, join the charity events and clubs,participate in speeches, draw some posters and so on.It’s shrewd of them to think creatively.

At last, we inquired about what ability they learned.Some of them replied that they knew how to extract the DNA.Some replied that they learned to think deeply and wisely.The children told us that they had more life goals to acheive in the near future.

It's such a great honor to truly devote ourselves to do something for the planet, especially passing the ideas to others.

Conclusion

Via numerous activities held with the public and students, the process has so far been successful and gone on smoothly.In the year, we have gotten much positive feedback from our target audiences.We have devoted ourselves to promote synthetic biology and communicate with those who are interested in our projects.

Finally,we sincerely appreciate those who assisted us to protect our competition. With their altruistic help,we realized that this arduous competition is composed of not only experiments but association of all aspects in our society.

Education