Team:Tsinghua/Partnership

Partenership

Anti-Biofilm Community

Time:From August to October

Together with WHU-China, UM_Macau, DUT-China, SUSTech_Shenzhen, HK_HCY, (SZU-China), as one of the members, we joined the biofilm prevention community: the Anti-Biofilm Community (ABC) in August. The ABC member teams are dedicated to tackle the problem of biofilm contamination in our lives. Because of this common goal, we have engaged in many cooperations online and offline, from experimental design and modeling to interviews and scientific publicity.

Experimental design

In previous iGEM projects, there were few cases of biofilm treatment. In the early days of pre-experiment, many teams encountered problems in biofilm culture and quantitative analysis of biofilm. Together, the ABC team held a workshop to exchange experimental design ideas related with biofilm and discuss solutions to some existing problems. On the basis of literature and communication with experts, we have determined some quantitative indexes and specific methods of biofilm experiments. For example, in the quantitative problem of biofilm culture, we discussed the use of biofilm thickness, fluorescence intensity and other information for quantitative. According to Tsinghua's idea, we came up with the use of the ratio of planktonic bacteria and biofilm after degradation (light absorbance) to determine the degree of biofilm degradation.
In order to observe P.aeruginosa biofilm with laser confocol microscopy, we planned to transform P.aeruginosa with a plasmid that could trigger the constitutively expression of GFP. We got into trouble because many of the commercial plasmids were not compatible in P.aeruginosa. Fortunately through ABC community, SUST_China offered us the desired plasmid pUCP20-GFP. Moreover, we had a deep talk about the experience and protocol about electrotransformation of P.aeruginosa.

HP experience

Trying to solve biofilm contamination problems, we discussed the feasible fields for human practice and exchanged some ideas. We also shared our previous experience on HP, including online education, professor interviews.

Popular science handbook

In the secondary online conference, WHU_China proposed to design a popular science handbook, aimed at improving the public’s understanding about the biofilm via a more easier and acceptable way. With the cooperation of all the ABC members, the handbook was elaborated and printed. (Watch our Education Page for more details) This handbook was a precious symbol for our cohesive cooperation and our efforts to popularize our project and synthetic biology to the public.

Hardware and modeling

In order to simulate the flowing condition of biofilm growing in the pipeline, we exchanged our ideas about establishing the hardware with WHU. We also discussed biofilm culture conditions and the feasibility of microfluidic experiments for biofilm degradation.
Modeling was another fields that came out with plentiful achievements. Considering the similar targets and implementation, we bolstered the cooperation on modeling with WHU_China and UM_Macau, including the simulation of QS signal diffusion in P.aeruginosa biofilm and the distribution model of biofilm. We shared some papers related to the project and also provided constructive suggestions.

Overseas cooperation

To exert more influence through modern media and to attract more teams to notice and join our community, UM_Macau introduced our project and partnership work on their Instagram and facebook accounts. Through this publicity, HCY iGEM team joined our community and provide more inspirations for the handbook.

Popular science cartoon

We designed interesting cartoons to help the public better understand approaches to eliminate the biofilm. See below!

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