Team:USP SaoCarlos-Brazil/Public Engagement
EDUCATION AND PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT
SYNTHETIC BIOLOGY OUTREACH ACTIVITIES
SYNTHETIC BIOLOGY WORKSHOP
On August 24, the event “Sábado Aeroespacial” (Aerospace Saturday), organized by the extracurricular group Zenith Aerospace, from the São Carlos School of Engineering (USP), took place. The group, focused on the study and development of systems with applications in the aerospace industry, made during the event the launch of stratospheric balloon carrying 52 scientific experiments of students from all over Brazil, besides offering lectures by professionals from various áreas and presentations linked to science and engineering made by other extracurricular groups from University of São Paulo and Federal University of São Carlos.
Some workshops were also offered addressing robotics, electronics and biology. With more than 300 students from 16 states of Brazil participating, the event sought to arise interest in science and bring students from elementary and high school closer to the university environment. Our team was invited by Zenith, together with the São Carlos-Brazil IGEM team from the Federal University of São Carlos, to the ministry of a synthetic biology workshop.
Lasting 1 hour, our collaborative workshop was divided into two moments: presentation of concepts and application of them. During the presentation, we sought to teach enrolled synthetic biology concepts such as vector, promoters, ribosomes, coding regions, stopping codons and terminators functions, as well as showing how is the process of idealization, development and application of genetic circuits. To apply the learned concepts, we performed an activity in which students receive a problem and aimed to solve it using synthetic biology. During the activity, students were divided into three people groups and to each threesome was distributed a problem.
SYNTHETIC BIOLOGY PODCAST
On August 2019, our team participated with other Brazilian teams (USP-Brazil, UFRGS_Brazil, and Amazonas-Brazil) in a Podcast recording about Synthetic Biology for the “Ciência USP” Podcast.
The first edition of “Ciência USP” was on December 2018 and since then, several podcasts dealing with science-related issues have been released, always approaching the subjects in an accessible way to make them clear to the population. And in issue 15 “Have you heard of synthetic biology?”, the we had a very interesting experience of trying to talk about synthetic biology concepts more tangibly to the population.
In addition, each team was able to talk a little about their project and about iGEM. So, this podcast was an important form of dissemination for the population about Synthetic Biology, as the recording was released on some streaming platforms and also in the USP Journal. Click the link to listen to the Podcast: USP Journal: “Ciência USP #15: Você já ouviu falar em biologia sintética?”
SYNTHETIC BIOLOGY SEMINAR
All members of the IGEM USP São Carlos team are students of the São Carlos Institute of Physics of the University of São Paulo, so our team found it necessary to hold an informational event about our project.
Therefore, on July 7, 2019, some members of our team presented a short seminar with information on Synthetic Biology, iGEM and our IARA project for students and teachers of IFSC.
Following the presentation, several students spoke with members of our team to ask questions about Synthetic Biology and about iGEM. We were very happy to be able to spark their interest in the SynBio area.
WATER TREATMENT EDUCATION
Brazil is a privileged country in terms of water quantity as it has the largest freshwater reserve on earth. However, its distribution is not uniform throughout the national territory, so awareness of the conscious use and relevance of water treatment processes is of paramount importance to all Brazilians.
With this in mind, we at the iGEM São Carlos Team have developed our IARA project to remove mercury ions dissolved in water by constructing a bacterial biofilter transformed by synthetic biology techniques. Thus, the project is closely correlated with water treatment. Therefore, we are concerned with participating in some educational projects aimed at teaching the importance of water treatment methods, as well as raising awareness that encourages their conscious use.
During the development of the IARA project, we met the Municipal Secretary of Sustainable Development, Science and Technology and researcher Prof. José Tundisi. He was very interested in our team and put us in contact with some people from the São Carlos Autonomous Water and Sewerage Service (SAAE - Portuguese of “Serviço Autônomo de Água e Esgoto”) through the participation of some of our team members in a meeting of the San Carlos Water Safety Committee, as well as de presented us the opportunity to participate in a course on Water and Sanitation that took place at SAAE and was taught by Prof. Banu Örmeci from Carleton University (Canada).
The course taught by Prof. Örmeci was designed for students and faculty members of the universities of São Carlos and covered in detail the pros and cons of various water and sewage treatment methods employed in other countries. At the end of the course, we presented our project to remove mercury in water using a biofilter as a proposal for treatment in polluted water and met with Banu to guide us in addressing the problem and improving filter application.
At the meeting with the Water Safety Committee we got more information about the water treatment method employed in the city and we met SAAE operations manager Dr. Leila Patrizzi. From this contact, we discussed the possibility of doing some educational project in conjunction with the secretary.
Together with Dr. Patrizzi, we discussed the possibility of conducting educational guidance for visiting children's classes at the SAAE Water Treatment Plant (WTP). We are extremely excited about the idea as we recognize that it is of paramount importance to disseminate information about sustainable water use and its treatment and we believe that through raising children's awareness we can also indirectly raise adult awareness.
Thus, on October 08, we visited SAAE’s WTP to receive training on the processes carried out at each stage of treatment, what are the sources of drinking water and how is the quality control of water in São Carlos. On this day, Dr. Patrizzi explained to us how the sources of the Monjolinho and Ribeirão Feijão river streams are collected, which represent 40% of all São Carlos water abstraction, while the other 60% comes from the Guarani Aquifer underground. In addition, she explained about the removal of impurities from water in the WTP through the action of Ferrous Aluminum Sulfate (Al2(SO4)3) as a coagulant agent in conjunction with physical processes that assist in the formation of impurity flocs in flocculation tanks, how the water with the flocs already formed is taken to the sedimentation tanks to remove solid particles of impurities, as in the next step the water goes through a filtration process on sand filters and how the chlorination and fluoridation process of water distributed in the city.
On October 14, we accompanied a group of physical engineering students from the Federal University of São Carlos on a guided tour of SAAE's WTP as part of an Environmental Sciences course for Physical Engineering. In this visit, the methods and places of collection and treatment of water distributed in the city were explained to the students, as well as an explanation of how the flocculation, sedimentation and filter tanks work. This allowed us to become even more familiar with the water treatment processes employed at WTP and the maintenance of a WTP and the way it performs water distribution, especially in the municipality of São Carlos.
Following our schedule, on October 22nd we will conduct the first follow-up as SAAE-authorized educators to a guided visit to the WTP by children.
DOCUMENTARY: DAM DISASTER AT MARIANA
To create our project for the iGEM 2019 competition, we were motivated by the disasters of mining dams that hit the Brazilian municipalities of Mariana - Minas Gerais (MG) in 2015 and Brumadinho - Minas Gerais (MG) in 2019.
Some tests were reported to indicate a high presence of heavy metals, including mercury, in rivers that were contaminated by mining tailings mud. Thus, we have structured our project to build a biological filter that reduces the concentration of mercury in water.
These disasters caused great environmental and psychological damage to the victims. Because of this, we believe it is essential to disclose the negative impact these disasters have caused and to show the need to improve monitoring and enforcement of mining ventures in order to prevent disasters like these.
For this, we made a trip to the city of Mariana - MG, in order to conduct interviews with the civil guard and victims of the disaster that occurred in 2015. With the help of the tour guide Eduardo Rodrigues, we were able to conduct these interviews and we could still visit two districts of Mariana that were hit by mud: Paracatu de Baixo and Bento Rodrigues.
All stages of this trip allowed the traveling members to gain a better sense of how the Mariana disaster caused serious damage to the affected population. Then, based on the authorization of image and audio provided by the interviewees through an acceptance term elaborated based on the norms of the iGEM 2019 handbook and using all this experience and the materials produced during the trip, a documentary was produced whose main purpose was to portray the interviewees' experience during and after the disaster.
In addition, this documentary plays an important role in publicizing the disaster, raising awareness of the impacts that the disruption has had on the environment and the population.
Here is the link to watch the documentary in high quality.
The main purpose of the documentary was to disseminate the psychological and social problems caused to the Mariana disaster-stricken population and to transmit information about how the disaster occurred so that there is awareness of the damage that may be caused by negligence in the facility and inspection of mining dams.
Knowing about our documentary, the Cineclub Perangoera members invited the iGEM USP São Carlos team to present the documentary produced about Mariana dam disaster for the first time to the public. The documentary “Mariana: Crime without punishment” was screened on October 13, at the Amphitheater “Prof. Horácio C. Panepucci ”of the São Carlos Institute of Physics, and attended by about 20 people. Our documentary compliments by the public for the quality of its production and editing.
On October 18, we had a second presentation session of our documentary at 12:30 pm in the same amphitheater. About 50 people attended this event.
After the presentation of the documentary, we opened a space for discussion so that we could clarify doubts about the Renova Foundation (responsible for the disaster resettlement families project), how our project fits into the disaster landscape and the norms of environmental disasters like this one.
In addition, we were able to explain a little about our project and talk about how the visit to Mariana motivated us in biological circuit planning and filter construction and encouraged us to continue using science to positively impact the lives of people of our country.
MARCH FOR SCIENCE
On May 15th of 2019 thousands of scientists, professors, and students took to the streets in more than 220 cities across Brazil, to protest against the cuts in education and science funding. The march was organized in response to the successive cuts and freezes which endangers the maintenance of Brazilian federal universities and caused interruption of thousands of scholarships meant to support graduate students and their research. (Nature article)
We, as iGEM team, participated at the event with posters to talk to the citizens of São Carlos about the importance of research on biology, how microorganisms can be beneficial to our society, what is synthetic biology and we presented our project.
It was a great experience to be able to talk to people from outside of the university and realize the importance of accessible communication and scientific diffusion.
SCIENTIFIC EXPERIMENTS EXHIBITION
A very important part of our Human Practices consisted of the implementation of activities with a group of children of our city, São Carlos. Those kids are part of a project called “Projeto Cor Ação”, which is a non-profit organization, founded in 2017, responsible for transforming the reality of one of the less favored regions of the city.
The project currently has 50 children between 4 and 14 years old and intends to present different sport modalities and knowledge areas for those kids, so that they can develop physically, emotionally and intellectually in a healthy way.
We got in contact with “Projeto Cor Ação” through an organization responsible for promoting sports practice in our University, the “Associação Atlética Acadêmica do Campus de São Carlos”. This organization was already in contact with “Projeto Cor Ação”, in order to present different sports to the kids every month, and they were trying to find groups to present them different knowledge areas. Once they found out about our group, we began a partnership in order to help “Projeto Cor Ação” in the development of the children.
Therefore, we performed a morning of activities during which we worked concepts of physics and chemistry in a ludic way, doing interactive experiments with the children and teenagers. With the teenagers, we could focus on the concepts behind the experiments.
The activity consisted in the realization of the following experiments: visualization of Aedes aegypti mosquito larvae with a optical microscope, Van der Graaf experiment, gas expansion and compression with liquid nitrogen, carbon dioxide production from the reaction between vinegar and baking soda, demonstration of the behaviour of a Non-Newtonian fluid, production and manipulation of magnetic slime, confection of secret messages - after revealed with chemical reactions - and races with toy cars that work with luminous excitation.
As the focus of this activity was the presentation of concepts of physics, chemistry and biology for children, it was necessary to make a plan so we could explain the theory in a simple, ludic way, with accessible vocabulary. The group observed a huge interest from the children, teenagers and they supervisors, and we also perceived that there is great importance in making science accessible for people of different age ranges and schooling levels.
REFERENCES
- [1] ZENITH Aerospace. http://zenith.eesc.usp.br/wp/
- [2] USP Journal: “Ciência USP #15: Você já ouviu falar em biologia sintética?” https://jornal.usp.br/podcast/ciencia-usp-15-voce-ja-ouviu-falar-em-biologia-sintetica/?fbclid=IwAR2eN2cYzo_MBBQgdHAkCJ6HeFzElh6BODFb3hmPoyWAbvOst773YvvkzKE
- [3] SAAE São Carlos - Serviço Autônomo de Água e esgoto. https://www.saaesaocarlos.com.br/saaesc/index.php
- [4] SAMARCO. Entenda o rompimento. https://www.samarco.com/rompimento-de-fundao/
- [5] NATURE. Brazilian scientists strive to turn politicians into allies. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-01648-y
