Thanks to ZJU-China iGEM team, we shared a close relationship with each other throughout the year. During our project we keep in contact with each other and help each other in many aspects. Both teams benefit a great lot!
1.1 The early stage of the project: The first contact
In the open week of iGEM this year, NJU-China and ZJU-China first see each other in the screen. We discussed about the progress in synthetic biology and some advancement in the field we were interested in, like cancer treatment and tumor screening, genetically modifying tools, plasmid construction, etc.
At that time we just had a primitive design of our project, so it was inevitable to have some improper design in our project, and luckily, ZJU-China offered us some points of view generously. For example, we wanted to transfect liver cell by adeno-associated virus, and ZJU-China suggested us to take safety into consideration, and that we’d better interview professors and doctors to finally choose the optimal vector.
1.2 The early stage of the project: The East-China Meetup
The East-China Meetup held by Jiangnan University brought us two iGEM team together again. So far, we had had our project subject almost determined, and we found plenty of points for us to collaborate together, ranging from target selection and vector construction, to Human Practices and future application. Thus we notarize the partnership between NJU-China and ZJU-China. Additionally, since both of our project will ultimately be classified as drug, so we suggested them study on the approval process and legal provisions of related drugs before determining the formulation of commercial plans.
2.1 The middle stage of the project: public concerns
ZJU-China mainly focus on the improvement on the MRI detection of tumor by modifying the Magnetosome derived form bacteria with scFv to specifically target at HER2-positive breast cancer. In our online discussion, we reached an agreement that both of us had better further our work on the issue of public acceptance, for fear that it may cause panic when it comes to injecting the bacteria-derived nano particle into patient like ZJU-China does or genetically modify patients’ liver cell like NJU-China intends. As a result, we began to look into the public attitude of our project. Inspired by ZJU-China, we make a question broad with questions related to gene therapy, on which the public can paste their opinion ( agreement or disagreement). The question broad was presented and offered us firsthand information, which eventually helps to form the overview towards public concerns upon gene therapy.
2.2 The middle stage of the project: NJU-GeneScript Conference
The NJU-GeneScript conference held by NJU-China and GeneScript in Nanjing is a platform where we can discuss freely with professors and experts from various background. We sincerely invited ZJU-China to take part in it and discuss about the questions we both concerns, including the ethical issues raised by genetically modified cells, the safety concerns related to gene therapy, etc. As to the safety issue, we were actively engaged in the discussion with other iGEMers and professors, which in turn gave us inspiration and innovative thoughts towards this significant question.Apart from that, we were also curious about whether our project would come into application, and the barrier we needed to overcome. The experts from GeneScript, as the industry insider, kindly gave us some suggestions and envisioned future planning for both of us.
2.3 The middle stage of the project: A trip to Genechem
After a series of investigation and interviews on the safety issue of our project, NJU-China and ZJU-China both agreed that it was time for the future planning, which is that how can we put our design into the application with safety and efficiency ensured. At this time, we were switched our focus on the drug industry, and finally we successfully contact Genechem, a company focus on cancer therapy. Later, we were honored to be invited to visit to Genechem in Shanghai to communicate and interview with their research personnel. However, it is a pity that ZJU-China cannot went to Shanghai with us due to some reasons. Consequently, we, on their behalf, discussed some topics with Genechem ZJU-China was interested in, including how to establishing and constructing the tumor target library and the approval procedure of a drug from the laboratory to the market. Throughout this trip, we discover a large numbers of issues unconsidered, like how can we ensure the manufacture quality, what is the edge of our product compared to the existing drugs or therapies, etc. These newly emerged questions inspired both our teams to consider beyond the laboratory. In all, this is a quite a meaningful trip both for us and for ZJU-China.
3.1 The middle and later stage of the project: Online meeting of trouble-shooting
As our two projects progressed, we decided to have a periodic summary meeting on October 17, mainly for trouble-shooting and reminder of unnoticed points. For example, ZJU-China raised the concerns of the choice between lenti-virus or naked plasmid to transfect the liver cell, and after comprehensively considering the suggestions we received before, they recommended us to us naked plasmid. We in turn stressed the importance of validating the efficiency of specific binding of the targeted contrast agent. In that meeting, we discussed almost every detail of each project, ranging from project design and experiment design to modeling and HP. This online discuss is of great help to each other, and we appreciate their effort very much.
3.2 The late stage of the project: Simulated Giant Janboree presentation
The Giant Janboree of iGEM competition is a good opportunity to exhibit one’s project, so it is pretty crucial to present it well. NJU-China and ZJU-China plan to simulate visual Giant Janboree presentation just after the wiki freeze.