For me, for you, for everyone

Countless efforts had been made to remove the barrier between science and the public. As interdisciplinary, synthetic biology always suffers misunderstanding and discrimination. Under this circumstance, we members of XMU-China tried to bridge the gap between science and the public, helping people of all ages to have more access to learning properly about synthetic biology. Moreover, we were also wondering if our trivial efforts could make a big difference, alluring more people to the field of synthetic biology. Just as the saying goes, “Education is the lighting of a fire.” Through a series of different educational events, we hoped that the fire could be kindled and passed on, enlightening more and more people. The goals of our job can be listed as followed:

Foster successor for iGEM concepts

Taking on new members from undergraduates at Xiamen university is the first step to develop an outstanding team. Thus, a serious of information sessions were carried out to give in-depth conversations with undergraduates in different majors, which promoted the dissemination of both the knowledge of synthetic biology and concepts of iGEM. Innovate the Syn-Bio-Tech, Better the World.

Before the recruitment of new team members, several lectures were held to introduce the iGEM competition, by which we introduced the concepts, calendar, and excellent projects, helping them to understand how we changed the world using the technology we learned. The Q&A section after the lectures gave us more opportunities to communicate with them and arouse their interest in competition and innovation. After that, many undergraduate students showed strong curiosity in synthetic biology and the iGEM competition and were further invited to join the online group for follow-up activities.

Three training courses were prepared for all students in the online group, including a detailed introduction about what the synthetic biology and iGEM are, how to carry out literature retrieval, and how to use Snapgene software to design genetic circuits. We chose these topics to show them more basic knowledge and enable them to use synthetic biology tools and techniques. Thus, they could understand synthetic biology and iGEM on a deeper level and be inspired to find out more.

Though our original goal was attracting more excellent students to join us for competition, we believed that we actually harvested more than that finally. We offered an opportunity for students to have a deeper insight into synthetic biology. We have delivered the feeling, experience, and knowledge in the last season to these fresh students. Education is not only teaching and learning but the inheritance and development. They are not only the new like-minded team members but also the successors of iGEM concepts.

Spark adolescent’s thinking about synthetic biology

Synthetic biology, whose emergence marked the third biotechnology revolution, significantly represented the prime occurrence of interdisciplinary science. As such a promising subject though, it still remains unknown to most people. Therefore, it’s necessary to give initial guidance about synthetic biology to the public, especially to those at a young age. Unlike undergraduate students, teenagers or kids do not have enough biological knowledge. So, simply teaching, repeating what the textbooks say, would not be very rewarding for them, which would also make our education less meaningful. Therefore, for the youth and kids, we prepared different education plans to spark their thinking about synthetic biology.

For the youth

It is believed that young people are the most innovative and dynamic group. To introduce synthetic biology to high school students and let them experience the fun of scientific research, we prepared interactive lectures and different discussion topics, which mainly focused on the means of implementation and application of synthetic biology.

Comparing the genetic circuit to electrical circuits and the assembly line of the “bio-factory” to a real-world factory, we gave the students a deeper and more visualized understanding of synthetic biology. Taking our project for instance, we also showed them how iGEMers employed synthetic biology tools to solve the problem in the real world, including the selection of chassis, regulation and control of genetic circuit, and modification of the protein expression. In the end, students took an active part in the open discussion. They showed their imagination based on their own understanding and left their views and ideas on the signing board. This education not only embedded the concepts of synthetic biology in their deeper mind but also aroused our inspiration and thinking.

For kids

When holding the event on “Science and Technology Museum Day”, we found that most participants were children in primary school, who had not learned anything about biology and chemistry systematically. So, it was a significant challenge to help them understand specific knowledge, such as the basic concept of synthetic biology. Therefore, we designed content-rich and beautiful brochures to attract the attention of parents and their kids, who became our loyal audience eventually.

The whole activity was designed based on the concept of edutainment. We first took "the way to unlock a cell phone" as the entry point, and vividly popularized that DNA is the key to make us different. Then we introduced the concept of DNA and its composition to the children. Subsequently, by using building blocks as an analogy, we explained the concept of biobrick in synthetic biology, which was greatly accepted by children and their parents.

After the interactive presentation, we held four simple games to help children further understand synthetic biology and prepared a series of self-designed products as prizes. Games and prizes attracted the kids strongly and we were delighted to find that many children even volunteered to join in the games! While they were exploring, we also provided guidance when they got into trouble and explained the scientific principles embedded in it patiently.

During Science and Technology Museum Day, we really feel that many of them are curious about nature and thirsty for knowledge. We were also glad to see that the edutainment worked well beyond our expectations. We hope that the activity can plant a seed of synthetic biology in their hearts, which will bear abundant fruits in the future.

Promote the Understanding of Synthetic Biology for Public

In addition to those offline activities, we also chose several social media as platforms to carry out our education for the public, which was applicable to all age groups.

To break the barrier between science and the public, we shared briefs of recently published articles in synthetic biology and outstanding topics in recent years of iGEM via our official accounts like Weibo and WeChat. These beautifully illustrated articles could introduce the great jobs of synthetic biology with simple language, which would provide a better understanding for the public. To raise awareness of the public about acute hepatopancreas necrosis disease (AHPND), we also created some works to explain the pathogenic mechanism, the hazard to shrimp, and the threat to food safety.

Invited by Team Stony_Brook, we wrote an article and drew a comprehensive illustration of AHPND. In our articles, we tried to avoid academic phrases to make it accessible to average people. For the inevitable "new" vocabulary, we tried to explain them in details, so that the readers could read through the entire text smoothly. Eventually, after meticulous preparation, our article was published in their journal.

Invited by FAFU, we compiled a comic book together with the other five teams. Through well-designed cartoon characters and interesting conversations, we presented the background of our project in a more understandable format instead of simple words. We also combined scientific knowledge in the comic, hoping to improve the public identity of synthetic biology.

To let more people read the journal and the comic book and be aware of those issues, they were also translated into Chinese and posted on Chinese social media for better distribution. Hopefully, all efforts could influence social attitudes towards synthetic biology.

This year, we were also invited to participate in the Living Earth Art Exhibition 2022 “Biology and art”. Moved by Hawaiian honeycreeper, an organism dying out in 2003, we created an artwork named Archivex, aiming at reminding people of the importance of protecting nature and appealing to everyone not to harm the earth for selfish gains.

Conclusion

This year, we focused on people around us, hoping our actions could actually have a positive impact on society. According to the characteristics of people of different ages, we designed targeted educational paradigms. In this case, our educational events could cover a wide range of age groups, which satisfied the need for universal education. And we believed that all efforts we made would in return benefit ourselves in the future, forming a virtuous cycle.