Team:Aix-Marseille/Notebook
We discussed the questions we had to ask ourselves before choosing a project (Is it feasible ? Was it already done ?) and decided that next Wednesday we’ll try to eat together at lunch to get to know each other.
We looked at the 2019 project’s files and wiki to get a better idea of the work we would have to do, then we chose our primary and secondary secretaries. For the next meeting, we’ll divide into small groups and do some research about the different subject proposals.
We split into 3 groups with different sets of tasks to be more effective. We also presented our research on the subject proposals and kept 16 out of 25 for the next meeting.
We presented our researches again and decided to keep 4 subjects for the last vote:
- Bioluminescence
- Depollution of copper in the fields
- Heavy metals
- Green tides
The businessmen shared the files and one association already accepted to fund us.
The stalkers stalked IGEM hq and will have to register the team to two important events.
The headhunters found two students with informatic skills who might be interested in the project.
This meeting was very important because it is on this occasion that we chose the subject of our project. We had reduced our list to 4 themes: bioluminescence, red muds in Marseille, green tides and the copper decontamination. We finally chose Green Tides.
The team was divided into three groups :
- “businessman”, to find subventions
- “stalkers”, to spy on all iGEM teams and find information about iGEM competition
- “head hunters”, to find new team members to help us in this bid adventure
Each group presented its progress.
A member of the team made a presentation to us about the geography of green tides.
Because of the COVID 19 we were all confined in different places, so we did our first online meeting without thinking that it would be like this for a long time. We started trying to contact companies (Agrival, Olmix) or associations (GreenPeace, France Nature Environnement) linked to our project.
There was not so much advancement in making contact with the companies and associations selected because of the containment. But it was time for us to announce on Facebook the participation of a new Aix-Marseille iGEM team in this competition.
We read a lot of articles on seaweed and their revaluation to better understand the subject and choose a line of research. Indeed we thought about different possibilities:
- Reduce nitrate input to the ocean
- Improve seaweed revaluation techniques to promote their collection
- Treat hydrogen sulfide delivered by green algae when they decompose on the beach
We thought about activities we could propose for an event called “souk des sciences”. Unfortunately, this event has been canceled some days later. Finally, we ended this online meeting with a little “aperitif”.
We received an answer only from Greenpeace but they didn’t have time to answer our questions.
We made a return on the interview with Sylvain Ballu. He helped us to better understand what is done today for the revaluation of seaweed from green tides in France and how we could improve the techniques already used. We chose to concentrate on improving seaweed revaluation techniques to promote their collection. We split the team into two groups to study two areas: anaerobic digestion to form methane gas or production of ethanol fuel.
It was the international autism awareness day, so we all dressed up in blue for the online meeting. We have summarized the research carried out on the two areas under study. We also provided an update on the meeting with the iGEM ambassadors.
New actors were contacted, Lucy will do a skype with Philippe Potin tomorrow and Jeanne is setting an appointment with Ronan Pierre.
We always researched on both axes (methanisation and bioethanol). We studied the file that has to be sent to participate in the science festival. The did you know has been implemented, and a proposal for the annual team’s logo was made. And the FSDIE file was finalized.
Lucy has done a summary of her meeting with Philippe Potin (he quoted us the different methods and told us that there was a scientific article on formosa PUL) and Jeanne has done it to for Renan Pierre (he quoted that we can improve bioethanol production using marine biosaccharides, and the methanation was not possible because of the material). Boukari has contacted Olmix, and the person he was in communication with told us that for them bioethanol is not profitable. Maud will contact researchers about Formosa agriphila and Samuel will contact Terrapon.
At the research level we said that the only profitable solution for methanisation was co-methanisation but that we did not have the material. For bioethanol we made a slide show summarizing our research, we are interested in marine bacteria that can do fermentation and denitrification. We think that we have to cultured algae for the profitability even if the basic goal is to collect the algae from the beach it could be useful for us to continue the process even during the months when there are almost no algae. We chose the theme of the project which will be the revalorization of the algae in algocarburants.
A proposal of video-conference with Nantes for a possible collaboration was made.
Maud presented some research about Formosa Agariphilia, little documentation, and about sugars in ulva, we found information for rhamnose with an E.coli enzyme that can transform into ethanol, taking the E.coli route and transforming in saccharomyces. We also researched for xylose and ulvan.
We proposed some ideas for the logo.
Samuel had contacted Terrapon, he got information about the pul. Pr.Walburger, a searcher and professor at Aix-Marseille university, tells us that formosa may not be the best idea.
We have chosen the sugars xylose and rhamnose, both fermentable, now we have to look for the chassi and see if it uses its sugars to grow.
We continued the FSDIE financing file. Signature with Wiloo.
We made a Skype meeting with the team from Nantes who wish to work on formosa, we are waiting to make more progress on our respective projects for a possible collaboration.
We don't know if we will have access to the laboratory, unfortunately.
We contacted Walburger who advises us to use E.coli.
A Debate on the research was started.
We decided to carry out the projects over 2 years instead of one year following the cancellation of the trip to Boston and the lack of access to the laboratory due to the health situation. The budgets for the funding applications must therefore be redone. Discussion on the 2 videos to be made.
We are starting to think about a name for the project.
Samuel presented his chassi research.
For the degradation of ulvan, we are trying to find out which enzymes are essential for the degradation of ulvan.
Several events were canceled or postponed because of the covid as the science souk.
Jeanne has contacted a friend for the video presentation of the project.
We discussed the name of the project.
On the search level, there is no news. Samuel and maud the following Monday will be presented a research summary.
Lucy takes care of the brochure, making a montage of our heads for the group photo.
The first did you know you is validated. Camille made an annual logo, Laurie is looking for someone to vectorize it. We also started to write the first questions of the google form.
Study of the economic part of fuel production (IEA article). For the research part, we have evoked the fact that extracting rhamnose and then making bioethanol production would allow us to be more profitable or to make co-production.
We explored the PulDB website which gathers all the PULs known to date. We can thus find those of Formosa Agariphila: pulH.
The Clostridium bacterium was mentioned as a chassis because it is transformable and above all, it lives in the same environment as the Ulva.
We took again the criteria of medals. We have finalized the google form which must be put in the week on the social networks. We discussed the last modifications to be made on the logo. We had some information about the maintenance of the Science festival but no news for the Science souk.
A drive has been opened to be able to write all the project name ideas.
Exams! No meeting
We discussed E.coli as a chassis because it would transform rhamnose into propanediol. We validated the logo! Samuel proposed to make an online meet-up.
We discussed the organization of the possible online meet-up. Lucy finished the brochure.
We have started to list the selected frames from the literature with the advantages and disadvantages.
We discussed the deliverables: motion design video and presentation video (instructions, deadlines...).
Lucy went to the meeting for the Science Festival which will be mostly online. We discussed on the different ideas for the meet-up.
A point was made with the PI, we must try to focus less on research but more on industrial. It is also necessary to think about the difficulties of the way of rhamnose, the organisms used today in the industries which are mainly yeasts.
We started to make postcards for the collaboration with Düsseldorf.
We chose the project name “Make some Rham-noise!”. It was our favorite one because we found the mix between “Make some noise” and “rhamnose” funny. Plus, we started looking for ideas for the organization of a meet-up.
We made a return on the meeting between Maud and BIAM but they can’t help us because they don’t really work on what we are interested in. We also continued our research on the scientific aspect of the project.
We talked about different collaborative projects:
- A video project with all the French-speaking iGEM teams
- A postcard project with European iGEM teams
Maud and Lucy made a return to the meeting with James about the scientific aspect of our project. We also selected some iGEM teams we want to participate in our meet up. Besides, we proposed ideas for our project’s logo: we wanted a megaphone with green seaweed and rhamnose.
The definitive logo for our project was designed! We wrote the storyline for the French video.
We made a return on the safety form and meet-up. We started to talk about the creation of the wiki. It was also the week when we published all the work we did with the french speaking teams on social networks. It was the accomplishment of some weeks of work so we were very proud and glad to show the result.
We worked on our gene sequences to optimize them and unfortunately, our meet-up was canceled due to no response to our invitation. We participated in an art project on seaweed from Nantes by sending a drawing concerning our project. The science festival was canceled due to the restriction of health in Marseille, so we have contacted the school to present our project to children thanks to our motion video design. The video was almost finished, all we had to do is to synchronize the subtitles.
We wrote the script for the promotion video and divided it between who can be present on the day of filming. We also began to think about the constitution of our poster.
The script was redistributed because some parts were too long and another too short.
We translated all the speaking in french to do the subtitles and we sent some pictures taken during the filming to the filming director Emile. Jeane has ordered our team's sweat. We worked on the constitution of our wiki, like translating all the interviews with actors and our meeting.
Assagi has told us what we still have to do for the wiki, so we distributed the work between us. Maud and Lucy had talked with our instructors and they help us to do a better explanation about our proof of concept in E.coli.
We worked on the different text for the wiki that we still have to do.