Team:University College London

From 2012.igem.org

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= New to iGEM? =
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= UCL iGEM 2012 =
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iGEM – international Genetically Engineered Machine - is an international competition, to promote research into new uses of synthetic biology (glossary). Teams from Universities and High Schools from all over the world meet to compare research, and receive awards for success in particular categories.
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We are the 4th team from UCL to enter this competition, and we are hoping to build upon the success of previous teams. Like many iGEM teams, we come from diverse courses - computer science, biochemistry, medical sciences and biochemical engineering. We are also collaborating with student filmmakers and architects. The purpose of this wiki is to ‘show-off’ what this team has achieved. We realise iGEM wikis have a lot of content, so if you are new to iGEM you may find the following guide useful.  
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==Welcome to the UCL 2012 iGEM project.==
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This is a wiki-in-progress, keep checking back for updated content and project news.
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==Tour of the UCL 2012 Wiki==
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==What is this iGEM I keep hearing about and why is it so great?==
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After the HOMEPAGE, the TEAM page is a good first-stop on the wiki. Visit here for an introduction to the team members and a better breakdown of their roles in the project.
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The International Genetically Engineered Machine competition (iGEM) is the premiere undergraduate Synthetic Biology competition. Student teams are given a kit of biological parts at the beginning of the summer from the Registry of Standard Biological Parts. Working at their own schools over the summer, they use these parts and new parts of their own design to build biological systems and operate them in living cells. This project design and competition format is an exceptionally motivating and effective teaching method (from the iGEM website)
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If you are ready to learn more about our scientific work, be sure to visit our RESEARCH page. Eventually, you will find all the details of our research here, but as this is a ‘work in progress’ we will briefly outline the concepts here. Our research goal is to construct an island from plastic waste. Essentially, by engineering bacteria to bind and aggregate plastic waste – which is found in huge abundance in many of the world’s oceans – we will be able to turn this waste into a valuable resource. Realistically, these plastic islands could be collected and re-cycled, but our team are also promoting the idea of a ‘Plastic Republic’ – a habitable island formed from the aggregated plastic waste. 
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As part of the RESEARCH, we generate both experimental and computational data. For the experimental data, the Biochemists, Engineers and Medical Scientists design the experiments, and all of the team members pitch in to produce the data. However, most iGEM teams also have a contingent of Computer Scientists (Erin, Joanne, Phillipp and Tom) who use software to model the unpredictable aspects of the project. We rely heavily on predictions made by this computational data, which guide the experimental science.
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==So what system are you building?==
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A whole section of our wiki will be devoted to HUMAN PRACTICE, which is another key aspect of iGEM. Beyond the lab work and computer modelling, iGEMers go out into the community and demonstrate their research.  This is a vital to promote understanding of our research – to individuals who are not necessarily involved in science - and to gain valuable insight into how they perceive our research. This is usually a very interesting page as many teams, UCL 2012 included, chose controversial research projects that raise important questions.
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The short answer: we are building a Plastic Republic.
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The NOTEBOOK page of our wiki documents, day-by-day, the above activities of our team members, or if you visit the ACHIEVEMENTS page of our wiki you will find a summary of our main RESEARCH and HUMAN PRACTICE successes.  
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The long answer: You may have heard of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a giant vortex of plastic waste and sludge trapped in the North Pacific ocean. We plan to engineer bacteria to clean up the microplastics which constitute a large proportion of the Garbage Patch. We aim to do this in one of two ways:
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Once you have navigated around this site, you should be comfortable touring other iGEM wikis also. If you have any questions about the content of our wiki, or iGEM in general, please contact rhiannon.wilkinson.09@ucl.ac.uk
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- Breaking down pieces of plastic until they are no longer toxic to marine organisms
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- Clumping together microplastics to form ‘plastic islands’
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Our little islands will be left to grow as they accumulate more debris, creating a new marine ecosystem out of our plastic pollution.  Eventually our plastic wasteland will be transformed into a synthetic utopia – a new Plastic Republic.
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==We’ll see you there for iGEM 2030.==
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Revision as of 09:16, 25 June 2012

Contents

UCL iGEM 2012

Welcome to the UCL 2012 iGEM project.

This is a wiki-in-progress, keep checking back for updated content and project news.

What is this iGEM I keep hearing about and why is it so great?

The International Genetically Engineered Machine competition (iGEM) is the premiere undergraduate Synthetic Biology competition. Student teams are given a kit of biological parts at the beginning of the summer from the Registry of Standard Biological Parts. Working at their own schools over the summer, they use these parts and new parts of their own design to build biological systems and operate them in living cells. This project design and competition format is an exceptionally motivating and effective teaching method (from the iGEM website)

So what system are you building?

The short answer: we are building a Plastic Republic.

The long answer: You may have heard of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a giant vortex of plastic waste and sludge trapped in the North Pacific ocean. We plan to engineer bacteria to clean up the microplastics which constitute a large proportion of the Garbage Patch. We aim to do this in one of two ways:

- Breaking down pieces of plastic until they are no longer toxic to marine organisms

- Clumping together microplastics to form ‘plastic islands’

Our little islands will be left to grow as they accumulate more debris, creating a new marine ecosystem out of our plastic pollution. Eventually our plastic wasteland will be transformed into a synthetic utopia – a new Plastic Republic.

We’ll see you there for iGEM 2030.

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