Bio Iuvenis

Our team created an international YouTube collaboration with the aim of teaching synthetic biology methods to people around the world. We collaborated with teams like Korea HS and Lambert High School to make this channel, and we published videos explaining procedures commonly used in a lab, such as midi-prepping and PCR (Polymerase Chain Reactions). Some of our teams also published videos providing in-depth explanations on the goals and purposes of their projects. We spread our YouTube channel to other iGEM teams through email and Instagram. While giving synthetic biology presentations (mentioned below), we also included our team's videos to explain our project and demonstrate what we were doing in the lab. Altogether, our channel garnered dozens of subscribers and hundreds of views over a one-month period. Check out our channel!

The Bio Iuvenis channel, and some examples of our videos

Survey Results

We sent out a survey gauging public awareness on how a stroke occurs and how post-stroke patients are treated. We distributed this survey to our collaborations and partnerships teams, many of whom were overseas and provided a more diverse sample of responses. By sending out a survey, we were able to discover more information on the public's perception of stroke and its treatment. We also used our survey results as inspiration for content on our team's YouTube channel, as we uploaded multiple videos that addressed the lack of knowledge in topics like how an ischemic stroke occurs.
Here are the questions and results:

Have you or someone you know suffered a stroke in the past?

A lot of people do not know someone who has suffered a stroke, suggesting they might not have an understanding of what a stroke is on a personal level

There are two types of strokes: Ischemic and hemorrhagic strokes. Which one do you think is more common?

Similar to the responses of the previous question, many people are not familiar with what the details of what strokes are

Do you know about how an ischemic stroke occurs?

The majority does not know how an ischemic stroke occurs. This suggests that raising awareness on strokes could be key to promoting more research on stroke relief

Are you aware of any of the following therapies used to treat individuals who have suffered from a stroke?

Aspirin and antiplatelets, with 40.3% of respondents choosing this option,is part of a well-established treatment plan for patients with a history of stroke. However, 50.7% do not know of any of the ones listed.

On a scale of 1-10, how would you rank the importance of research into potential stroke therapeutics?

There is a general consensus that research into potential stroke therapeutics is important

We are a team researching a method of treating individuals who have suffered from a stroke through a Trojan horse therapy that we believe can pass trough the blood-brain barrier, a mechanism that prevents most molecules from entering neurons in the brain. Are you aware of this field of research?

Many people are unaware of what our Trojan horse therapy can and will do. Our project aims to make that clear.

Coloring Book

We created a children's coloring book themed around the field of biology! This work was a collaboration between EmpireGene, Korea HS, KCIS, and Stony Brook University. Children may choose to color diagrams of DNA, some common lab tools, and also other cellular diagrams. To engage the public with our coloring book, we emailed almost two dozen public libraries in New York City and New Jersey with our coloring book. We received responses from Garfield and Montvale public libraries, stating that they had printed our coloring book and made it available within their children's sections. Download here

Cover page of the collaboration coloring book

Synthetic Biology & NeuroTrojan Presentations

We presented virtually and in-person on synthetic biology and information about our project at Stuyvesant High School, Mountain High School, Bergen County Academies, and a Korean day care center. Here, we provided a general overview of the synthetic biology field and described how we developed a fusion protein of HIRMAb and FGF-2/NT-3. We delved into specific synthetic biology techniques as well, such as PCR and Gibson cloning. We also discussed some ways we would use to confirm that our experiment succeeded, such as the transwell assay and the interaction assay. Each of our events included anywhere from 8 to 20 participants.

Presentation on synthetic biology in Stuyvesant High School

Presentation on synthetic biology in Bergen County Academies

Presentation on synthetic biology in day care located in Seoul, Korea

Fluorescence Microscopy Info Session

We organized an in-person info session to teach students about the methods and capabilities of fluorescence microscopy as an imaging tool. Our team shared various fluorescent images and discussed their morphological characteristics. We also discussed how we implemented fluorescence microscopy in our own project. More specifically, we described how we used eGFP (Enhanced Green Fluorescent Protein) to stain the receptors for our proteins of interest and how we used a secondary antibody attached to a red dye to mark our Trojan horses. Over a dozen high school students attended our in-person event.

Communication