Team:BOKU-Vienna/Attributions

Navbar

Project Inspiration Description

Attributions

We would have come nowhere close to what we’ve achieved without the support of many helpful, generous people who have supported us with valuable inputs and insights all along the way. Especially as a young team with little experience, this help was crucial for our project to develop in the direction it has. We would like to use this page to thank all the people who have walked a part of the path with us on our journey towards realizing this project!

Team accomplishments

Idea - Many members of our team have come up with ideas, and we finally voted for Mycolactone Diagnostics. Over the past months, the whole team has contributed to the further development of the idea into the project at hand.

Lab- With the help of many supervisors, working groups, and former iGEM students from previous years, our team has worked tirelessly on the realization of the project. We would like to thank our University, BOKU Vienna, to provide us with lab access, and all or other sponsors for their generous provisions of consumables, support and services. We successfully screened a working transcriptional riboswitch that increases the expression of downstream genes in the presence of Mycolactone. Also, we were able to proof the functionality of our system with a working transcriptional Theophylline riboswitch which we decided to use as a proof of principle in chase we would not be able to work with Mycolactone. Our system produces a visual readout in the presence of the target.

Human Practices and Education- We would like to thank everyone who has provided input here – all our interviewees, or collaborating teams, everyone who has provided some feedback and all our advisors. We have organized a Pub Quiz, School Visits and events such as a booth and poster presentation at the European Researchers’ Night and the Kids’ University Day for the education part. For Integrated Human Practices, we have conducted interviews, and sought advice from experts in the field which we have then integrated as a feedback loop in the development of laboratory procedures and directions, but also in product development and the positioning of our test kit.

Thank you for your support:

Our supervisors: Dipl.-Ing. Dr. Hans Marx, Martin Altvater, Ph.D., Univ.Prof. Diethard Mattanovich, Ass.Prof. Dr. Michael Sauer, Ass.Prof. Brigitte Gasser, Dipl.Ing. Dr. Jürgen Zanghellini and Dr. Alexandra Graf
Thank you for your great lectures in the beginning and all your support throughout the summer.
The Team members from last year´s iGEM Team BOKU-Vienna 2018, who have helped us with useful hints and tricks throughout the semester.
Our Mentor Christopher Whitford from the iGEM Team Bielefeld CeBiTec 2017

Project Support and Advice

  • Mycolactone aptamer sequence aquired from Thomas Caltagirone, Ph.D., CEO of Aptagen and his team. Selex performed by Samuel A. Sakyi.
  • Theophylline riboswitch sequences and design templates
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4615730/
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3575828/
  • Evelyn Eggenstein (Arbor Biosience), Benjamin Bächle (HiSS Diagnostics GmbH) and Dominik Jeschek for your great support concerning the cell free System
  • Synthetic Mycolactone aquired from Dr. Kingsley Asiedu, Medical Officer in charge of Buruli ulcer, Department of Neglected Tropical Diseases, Geneva
  • Gene-Parts we got from the Department of Biotechnology at BOKU-Vienna that we used: All Backbones for golden gate cloning
  • The following Parts we already got in Backbone 1:
    • J23105+B0034
    • J23119+B0034
    • T7 promotor+RBS
    • B1001
    • mCherry
    • amilGFP (didn’t work)
    • amilCP
    • GFP

Fundraising help and advice

  • iGEM Team BOKU-Vienna 2018
  • Franziska Doleschal and Petra Hofbauer from the secretary of the Department of Biotechnology, BOKU Vienna
  • Our supervisors

Lab Support

  • The working group Team Sauer from the Department of Biotechnology, BOKU Vienna for their tireless support in the lab.
  • Ursula Kieswetter for helping our team with orders, making competent E. Coli and general introductions into practical lab work.

Difficult technique support

  • DI. Dr. Hans Marx, DI. Dr. Hannes Russmayer and Martin Altvater, Ph.D. for diluting and handeling Mycolactone and ensuring its safe disposal.

Project advisor support

  • iGEM Team BOKU-Vienna 2018, our supervisors and the working group Team Sauer

Wiki support

  • Thanks to the iGEM Team US_AFRL_CarrollHS for their great support

Presentation coaching

  • The working group Team Sauer from the Department of Biotechnology, BOKU Vienna
  • Biomin for giving us the opportunity to practise our presentation and providing feedback
  • Martin Moder from the Science Busters for sharing some of his expertise on science communication.

Human practices

We would like to thank everyone who has provided input here – all our interviewees, or collaborating teams, everyone who has provided some feedback and all our advisors. Together, we have organized a Pub Quiz, School Visits and events such as a booth and poster presentation at the European Researchers’ Night and the Kids’ University Day for the education part, as well as a comic booklet in the frame of our “Six Pics Challenge”. For integrated Human Practices, we have conducted interviews, and sought advice from experts in the field which we have then fed back into the development of laboratory procedures and directions, but also in product development and the broad design of our test, in particular our manual.

  • Especially, we would like to mention all interview partners who have provided insights from their experiences and expertise, namely:
  • Emmanuel Agumah from the ABURA Foundation for sharing his personal insights with the disease, and for highlighting the importance of raising awareness for the disease in the battle against Buruli ulcer.
  • Paul Anejodo, survivor of Buruli ulcer from Ibaji, Kogi State, Nigeria, for sharing some very personal experiences, and for inspiring us with his determination to spread awareness for the disease.
  • -Dr. Kingsley Bampoe Asiedu from the World Health Organization, manager of the WHO global Buruli Ulcer Initiative, for giving us the input we needed to start our research project on Buruli ulcer diagnostics.
  • - Thomas Caltagirone, PhD, CEO and President at Aptagen, and Albert Liao from Aptagen for their insights into aptamers as advantageous tools in diagnostics and for supporting us in improving our concepts and with trouble-shooting.
  • - Prof. Dr. Reingard Grabherr, Head of the Biotechnology Department at BOKU Vienna, for discussing biosafety-related issues with us and providing insights into ensuring the safety of a product containing live GMOs.
  • -Dr. Maman Issaka, PhD, Head of the Molecular Biology and Virology Department at the National Institute of Hygiene, Togo, for invaluable first-hand insights into the current state of disease diagnostics and experiences with affected patients.
  • - Dominik Jeschek, MSc, PhD candidate researching in Potsdam, for providing valuable insights into practical work and the experimental setup of cell-free systems.
  • - Martin Moder, PhD, Science Buster and Plant geneticist, for making the time and evaluating our presentation, discussing science communication and difficulties with public acceptance.
  • - Mark Nichter, PhD, University of Arizona, for discussing with us some social science aspects of Buruli ulcer research and diagnostics.
  • - Sian Stringer and Kim Blasdell from CSIRO in Australia, for taking the time and the detailed and interesting answers to our questions on the current state of Buruli ulcer research and diagnostic methods in Australia.
  • - DI Dr. Hans Marx for helping in setting an outline for Human Practices

Modelling

  • DI Dr. Jürgen Zanghellini for the help and guidance throughout the project.

Thanks and acknowledgements for all other people involved in making this such a rewarding and successful iGEM experience!
The University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna Austria is offering a course on synthetic biology for Master students as well as a synthetic biology seminar besides our iGEM course. We started with the first team meeting at the 26th of February. All our course materials were shared on our universities online learning platform. Team members started coming up with their own ideas after the first of our weekly meetings already. The lab was provided for our team from July till the mid of October. We decided on your project in the middle of May. Our choice fell on the one which appeared the most feasible and pressing at a time: the development of a new diagnostic tool for the detection of a neglected tropical skin disease.

Previous