Team:ULB-Brussels/Previous

Links for wiki's of the previous ULB teams and their abstracts

     One of the most basic actions of all engineers is the assembly and the deletion of fundamental parts (bricks). Bearing in mind that one of the purposes of the iGEM is to make the link between synthetic biology and engineering sciences, we'd like to manage those simple steps in the easiest way in biological systems.

     Unfortunately, in E. coli, it's still difficult to do that in one step because of the lack of genetic tools to catalyze homologous recombination with linear DNA. By the assembly of a unique plasmid containing different genes derived from phages, we aim to provide the iGEM with a system that would confer to E. coli the useful properties of yeasts.

     We called this plasmid Pindel, acronym for plasmid of insertion and deletion of genes.

     In order to ensure high quality work, we build our project on three complementary and parallel axes :

• The first one is lead by a group called "Wet lab" and composed of biologists. They are charged to propose a design and to construct and experiment the tool for characterisation.
• The second one is based on a group called "Modelling Team" and composed of mathematicians and physicists. They model the genetic circuit with parameters derived from the characterisation in order to find the optimal design and to refine the initial one.
• And finally, the third one, organised by the "Human Practise team" composed of students from social sciences, will discuss the ethical questions asked by people when living organisms are being handled. They aim to understand people's fears with statistical survey, to give them inform them about synthetic biology and to check the impact of our intervention on their initial fears.

     In this ever more energy-dependent world, where fossil fuel ressources become scarce and raise environmental issues, the search for green energy sources is a growing concern in both civil and scientific communities. In this context, hydrogen turns out to be an interesting alternative.

     However, current hydrogen production relies mostly on chemical processes, such as petroleum cracking or water electrolysis. In order to develop greener and more energy-efficient processes, the use of micro-organisms as biocatalysts for hydrogen production has been studied for many years. While no practical application has yet been achieved, nowadays the scientifical and technological advances allow further developments and opportunites in this field.

     The actual use of dark fermentation to produce hydrogen attains very low yields, compared to other fermentative biofuel synthesis, e.g. methane or ethanol. We propose to design a genetically engineered E. Coli, with an improved natural hydrogen production pathway, using the organic compounds found in waste waters as substrate. In addition, we will implement various features to enable the strain to perform other tasks related to wastewater treatment, such as signaling metallic contamination, eliminating nitrogen compounds, or hindering hydrogen consumption by methanogenic bacteria. We will also set up a planned death system in order to prevent its proliferation outside the wastewater treatment plant.

     Whether you want to stop a leaking ship's hull, or repair a fractured bone, you need a strong adhesive. Our project aims at producing a new generation of glue. In contrast to most glues, our glue is natural, biodegradable, efficient on wet surfaces and is composed of polysaccharides naturally produced by the Caulobacter crescentus bacterium. Using BioBrickTM standard biological parts, we engineered a synthetic Escherichia coli strain which synthesizes this adhesive material. To improve our expression system, we plan to use a new plasmid stabilization technique, the StabyTM system. This system stabilizes expression plasmid without using antibiotics, which is of major concern in large-scale production of biological materials.