Historically, many people have been excluded from science because of gender, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, disability or other reasons. At iGEM, we are committed to working towards a fairer and more inclusive world, where synthetic biology is a tool developed and used responsibly by ever more diverse groups of people, in many more locations, to help address the problems that affect their lives.

With the idea that more people can be included in the field of science, we have considered many special groups, such as visually impaired groups, children in remote mountain areas, and the elderly. For the visually impaired and the elderly, we mainly integrate the idea of accessibility design and aging into the design of wikis, and develop a series of tools for color blind people to promote their color cognition. In areas where educational resources are scarce, such as mountainous areas, we spread knowledge to the mountains through online teaching. And through the development of a variety of cultural and creative products and the holding of characteristic exhibitions to call on the people to raise money to fund children's learning.

Information accessibility design Information accessibility refers to making up for the differences in physical functions, environment, etc. by means of informatization, so that everyone (whether healthy or disabled, young or old) can equally, conveniently, and safely access, interact and use information.

At least 2.2 billion people worldwide suffer from visual impairment. Among these cases, at least 1 billion (nearly half) cases of vision impairment could have been prevented or could have been cured. It is not possible to accurately estimate the total number of visually impaired people worldwide based on the current available data. This is because population-based surveys usually do not report visual impairment in people who wear glasses or contact lenses to compensate for vision impairment caused by refractive errors. Nevertheless, it is safe to assume that at least 2.2 billion people worldwide suffer from visual impairment or blindness. This figure takes into account the near vision impairment caused by presbyopia (1.8 billion people, including corrected and uncorrected presbyopia), and the moderate to severe far vision impairment or blindness caused by the following causes: uncorrected refractive error (123.7 million people, such as myopia or farsightedness), cataract (65.2 million people), age-related macular degeneration (10.4 million people), glaucoma (6.9 million people), corneal opacity (4.2 million people) Diabetes retinopathy (3 million people), trachoma (2 million people) and other causes (37.1 million people), including those that are not classified in the survey or do not belong to any of the above categories. In addition, this figure also takes into account 188.5 million people with mild visual impairment whose cause is unknown. (WHO World Vision Report)

There are many different types of visual impairment, and each disease brings a different world

In 2019, the overall prevalence of moderate and severe visual impairment and blindness in China was 3.23% (45.92 million), 0.33% (4.67 million) and 0.61% (8.69 million), respectively. The prevalence of moderate visual impairment is significantly higher than that of severe visual impairment and blindness

Aging: People around the world are living longer. Today, the life expectancy of most people is over 60 years old. The number and proportion of the elderly in the world are on the rise. By 2030, one sixth of the world's population will be over 60. From 2020 to 2030, the number of people over 60 will increase from 1 billion to 1.4 billion. By 2050, the world's population over 60 will double to 2.1 billion. From 2020 to 2050, it is estimated that the number of people over 80 will triple to 426 million. Common symptoms of the elderly include hearing loss, cataract and refractive error, back and neck pain and osteoarthritis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, diabetes, depression and dementia. In addition, as people grow older, they may have several symptoms at the same time.

1. Identify blind areas
When we use our prejudice to solve problems, blind spots will arise. We should find out those blind spots, take them as opportunities, create new solutions, and produce inclusive design.
2. Understanding diversity
Recognize the diversity and difference of users: a good design should meet the needs of as many users as possible
3.Humans are true experts in adapting to diversity.
Inclusive design puts people at the center of the beginning of the design process. Those fresh and diverse views are the key to correct insight.
4. Provide optimized rather than absolute design options
Inclusive design does not attempt to meet every need of users, but by considering the diversity of users, it can reduce the possible obstacles in the use process, so that the design can produce the optimal effect for each user.
5.Solve one problem and extend it to multiple problems.
Everyone has certain abilities and limitations. Designing for the disabled will actually benefit more people. Restriction is not a bad thing. When we design for hearing impaired people, we will also benefit users in noisy environments, parents and teachers who teach children how to read.

We integrate the principles of barrier free design into all scientific communication processes of the team:

1. Education activities
In the science popularization of synthetic biology for the public, we have taken into account the needs of dialect users and visually impaired people, and recorded many versions of dialect popular science audio

2.Design of wiki

Use safety chromatography:
Choose a color with high contrast to facilitate color blind users to distinguish between cold and warm colors. When two or more cold or warm colors are used, there should be a clear difference in brightness and saturation; Avoid using low saturation and low brightness color matching; Use as few color combinations as possible; In color matching, avoid red green, green brown, blue purple, blue green and other color combinations that are difficult for color blind users to distinguish

Combination of color and graphics:
In the design, try to avoid using color alone to express specific meanings, and try to superimpose shapes or textures on the basis of color A better idea is to use graphics as the main color, and color and graphics are matched to provide users with multi-dimensional identifiability and memory points

Combination of color and text:
use text to help explain, and use text to help color blind users successfully complete the operation when color cannot be correctly distinguished.

Text readability:
The text covered on the background image is difficult to read because some images do not have enough contrast with the text, so the contrast can be increased by reducing the opacity of the background to make the text easier to read

Expected functions:
1. Speech can read text and freely adjust speech speed
2. Through multiple modes of different page background colors and text colors
3. The text size of the page can be adjusted
4. Be able to use shortcut keys to perform all operations eg. ctrl+A+S

Wiki will be evaluated by Shenzhen Accessibility Research Association (Shenzhen Accessibility Research Association /ARA).

The Information Accessibility Research Association has always been committed to promoting China's information accessibility development. It has participated in drafting a number of national standards in the accessibility field, held industry summits Compile industry white papers and achievement collections, produce professional books and popular science videos, carry out barrier free advocacy activities, call attention to the physical and mental development of disabled youth, promote barrier free legislation and Internet product barrier free optimization, etc., so that more people can understand and participate in information barrier free, and make unremitting efforts for everyone to enjoy modern civilization equally.

Although linguistic diversity increases naturally, as the Israeli linguist Ghil'ad Zuckermann said, linguistic diversity does not increase the distance between people, but can bring us together. Every language in our world has its own unique elegance and we should embrace that beauty.

Diversity is the premise of inclusiveness, and inclusiveness is the link of diversity (without the premise of diversity and differentiation, tolerance cannot be talked about. Without tolerance, diverse things will fall apart) Sustechigem2022 recognizes and respects different cultures in the world, and is committed to exchanges based on equality. China is a vast country with rich linguistic diversity. For the vast majority of people, dialects are their natural mother tongue, so it will be easier to be accepted and spread to popularize science to the people in the region in the form of dialects. The team members of Sustech igem 2022 come from all parts of China and different nationalities; We all hope to let the local people know more about synthetic biology, so we recruited volunteers from all over the country to record the audio introduction of synthetic biology in dialect.

Chinese is the most widely used language in the world. English is the official language of more than one billion people. There are 73 countries as the official language. The standard language of the United Nations is also English. Therefore, every WeChat push and questionnaire of SUSTech_Shenzhen has both Chinese and English versions, hoping to spread the knowledge of synthetic biology to more people.

The voices come from SUSTech_Shenzhen members

This is the transcript in English version:

For a long time, people have been searching for smaller materials endlessly. But what remains unchanged is that cells are always the basic units of biological structure and function. With the development of science and technology, the treatment for human is from the outside to the inside. The closer to the cell level, the more scientific and effective. Therefore, synthetic biology came into being. Imagine that each cell is a circuit, and the structure of each cell is an electronic component. Through proper connection, these electronic components perform their respective functions and make the circuit play a corresponding role. To put it bluntly, synthetic biology is to build components step by step from the most basic elements, aiming to build artificial biological systems and make them operate like circuits. He used genes as programming language, input them into cells, and let them synthesize high-value products like small machines. At present, synthetic biology has been applied to all aspects of our life: new bioenergy development, drug development, environmental pollution control. For example, algae is very simple compared with us, but it has chlorophyll that can convert light energy. So scientists use it to create a synthetic algae, which can convert CO2 into butanol by using light energy. From a substance that can cause global warming to butanol as an alternative fuel, so as to achieve true sustainable development. However, everything has its advantages and disadvantages. Some people believe that synthetic biology will destroy human beings. The original transmission rate of H5N1 virus is very low, but after being modified by scientists, it can have both high transmission rate and high selfishness rate. Once it is leaked, the consequences will be unimaginable. Just like COVID-19, which is now a global pandemic, many people believe that it is a man-made virus. If we block development of technology, we can only give the steering wheel to the bad guys. Unlike nuclear projects, biological experiments can be carried out in invisible situations, which is clearly demonstrated by all illicit drug laboratories in the world. Like it or not, synthetic biology has emerged, but more importantly, we should attach importance to their potential and embrace this technology. Synthetic organisms can cure cancer, restore the environment, and stop our cruel treatment of other creatures. The power of synthetic biology is that organisms can be transformed into inherently sustainable ones.

Using different timbres in music works is very similar to using different colors in art works. The timbre and color can also give people a clear, bright, warm, dark and other feelings.

There are many musicians who compare music with color and associate them separately. In 1876, the famous musician Posakot proposed a comparison that musicians can accept: string music, voice - black. Copper tube, drum - red; Wood tube - blue. The conductor Godfrey put forward the opinion that flute is blue. Clarinet - Rose. Copper tube - red. This comparison has been approved by more people. For example, when appreciating the second movement of Beethoven's Sixth Symphony, we might as well imagine that the clear flute part blows out the blue sky, while the clarinet solo phrase comes from its pure and beautiful timbre. It seems to present the beautiful color of rose. The relationship between music and color in people's sense is multifaceted. In addition to the relationship between timbre and color, there are also tunes, harmony, rhythm, drop sex, sound area, and so on. They can connect people with various colors. It was a long time ago that people proposed this kind of connection. As early as Ptolemy, the great scientist of ancient Greece in the second century, had this idea. Since then, people have been explaining the relationship between them. The first person to point out that music and color (light) are related in nature is Achenateus Kosher, who believes that music is an imitator of the phenomenon of light. In 1697, Vogan Lille had such adjectives in his book The Famous Singer: "the red tone at the party", "the blue cornflower tone", "the black amber tone"。

For many people with visual impairment in the world, the color in their eyes is completely different from that in the eyes of normal people. They can hardly appreciate the colorful colors, and they are often unfairly treated on the way of job hunting. SUSTech_Shenzhen hopes to dye the black and white world into colorful through the combination of words and music. We selected nine traditional Chinese colors, carefully selected and experimented many times to find the right music to match them. For example, when expressing blue, we selected music to express the waves of the lake, so that visually impaired people can think of the rippling lake when listening to music, and feel the beauty of blue.

1.Mushan Purple：At dawn, the sky is white in the east; The sunset mist shrouded the distant mountains in purple. The distant mountain is purple. Its color seems to be in the twilight. There is a faint purple lingering in the mountains. It is soft and elegant, far away, beautiful and poetic.

2.Tianshui Bi: The imperial wife of Li Yu, the late leader of the Southern Tang Dynasty, once put the silk in the open air for the night when she was dyeing green. Because the silk was stained with dew, it changed and turned out to be very bright green. Later, people used this method to dye it and called it "Tianshui Bi", which was a kind of blue in ancient times, similar to modern light green and called jade green. We have no chance to see the color of Tianshui Bi in those years. According to the literature, this green is not dyed generally, but dyed light green. It becomes more green after being moistened by dew

3.Bamboo Moon: a moonlight scene in the bamboo forest, which is one of the traditional Chinese color blue series. It refers to the moonlight scene in the bamboo forest as a color word; It carries the noble spirit of the literati and is extremely cold and lonely. Bamboo moonlight is a feeling, so there are deep and light. A little green in blue, maybe a little purple grey. It feels different and presents different colors.

4. Red embers: charred charcoal or lake surface under the afterglow of sunset. The embers turn to ashes. Grey is a combination of black and white. If the embers are red, they are not gray, but some of them are dark red and yellow. The former is a kind of pessimistic and sad mood. When the building is about to collapse, the embers will turn to ashes; The latter is a positive and optimistic attitude. It is a kind of reincarnation that the sunset goes today and tomorrow returns. It can be described with such an elegant name as ember red, just like wild grass blowing and growing again. "The grass on the field is separated from the grass on the plain, and in one year, withers and thrives once each. Wild fires can't burn out, and the spring wind blows and grows again". There is hope in the embers. So this is the red of hope

5. Rice Yellow: Whether in the south or north, every autumn, you will see the golden patch, which is the hope. If we say that those who are often spoken of as having status yellow can only appreciate and look up. rice yellow is a true color closely related to everyone. Whether people remember its color or not, it blooms by itself every year when there is a bumper harvest

6. Pale green: It is a deep and dark green. The first frost wood leaves are pale green, and the green has turned yellow, showing a kind of old and gloomy color.

7. Jiqing: a concise dark blue, as the color of the sky after rain. The color comes from porcelain, which is like deep sea, clean without texture, deep tone, even shade, rich and beautiful, and is an excellent representative of ancient glazed porcelain.

8. Iris blue: the color of blue irises. April is the season when irises bloom. Iris is like blue butterflies conveying the message of spring

9. Iceberg blue: The blue color appears after adding a lot of gray and white, which looks like a cool glacier in nature. This color is similar to the moon white. Wearing it in summer is more pure than white, and more refreshing than dark blue.