Team:QHFZ-China/Collaborations
_Collaborations_
Overview
(1) BEAS_China 2019
[1] Meetup
BEAS_China and QHFZ-China held an offline meetup in the lab of QHFZ-China. First of all, QHFZ-China showed BEAS_China around the laboratory, especially experimental instruments in the cell room, which might be the only one in high schools in Beijing. Afterwards, the two teams introduced each other’s project design and progress, and raised key questions for each other. BEAS_China suggested that QHFZ-China should pay attention to whether mammalian cells violate the safety regulations of iGEM, and reminded QFHZ-China not to conduct unsafe experiments such as blood collection. QHFZ-China asked BEAS_China whether the non-natural amino acids in the system would react with heavy metals or affect human health.
[2] Parts and data sharing QHFZ-China helped BEAS_China test the harm of heavy metals in human cell line (HeLa cells), which emphasized the significance of BEAS_China’s project. Compared to controls (H2O, Mg2+ and Ca2+), Pb2+ led to decreased growth and destroyed cell morphology; Hg2+ and Cd2+ induced cell death. As little as 50 μM heave metals could induce these phenotypes.
In addition to this, QHFZ-China provided the plasmids containing RinA_p80α (BBa_K3007005), PrinA_p80α (BBa_K3007008) and sfGFP parts to BEAS_China，which allowed them to measure the amplifier system RinA_p80α - PrinA_p80α in their Hg2+ biosensor. At the same time, BEAS_China helped us verify the reliability and modularity of the amplifier system. To reduce the leakage of downstream gene expression, BEAS_China added a special tag at the C terminal of sfGFP to mediate sfGFP degradation. It improved the on / off ratio, and reduced the background. Their result was shown, which implied that we could make our uric acid biosensor more sensitive by optimizing the existing gene circuit.
[3] Interviewing a biosensor scientist together BEAS_China and QHFZ-China interviewed Xiaoyu Chen, a scientist in the field of biosensors and amplifiers, together via online communication. [4] Fellowship The two teams conducted a warm and friendly interaction.
(2) Worldshaper-Shanghai 2019
Worldshaper-Shanghai 2019 paid attention to the same topic: high level of uric acid. Besides，the parts we used are partially overlapped. Therefore, the two teams had two online meetups to communicate with each other and provide ideas for the problems encountered. For example, QHFZ-China advised Worldshaper-Shanghai to use hucO8 to replace the original hucO, when they found their HucR-hucO binding affinity was not high enough. QHFZ-China also gave some advices in hardware building. In turn, Worldshaper-Shanghai gave us advices in human practices. In addition, they inspired us to study the cell-free system.
(3) Peking 2019
Because it is the first year for QHFZ-China to join iGEM, we don’t know a lot about the issues related to the competition. Peking iGEM is an experienced team and provide us much help at many fields. For example, they shared many protocols for molecular cloning with us. Meanwhile, they helped us to measure fluorescence and absorbance of experimental samples by microplate reader and flow cytometry. When we were having difficulties to construct the pSB4A5-PhucR-Rinp80α-ygFU-HucR plasmid, they helped us to design and develop a new strategy as well as the construction to solve the problem.
In addition to experiments, they solved some problems in our wiki construction. What’s more, they discussed with our model group and taught us how to propose a model. For human practices, they helped us to contact the team leader of DLUT_China 2018, who had studied the use of synthetic biology to remove uric acid from patients' body, which provided guidance for our project.
In addition to experiments, they solved some problems in our wiki construction. What’s more, they discussed with our model group and taught us how to propose a model. For human practices, they helped us to contact the team leader of DLUT_China 2018, who had studied the use of synthetic biology to remove uric acid from patients’ body, which could provide guidance for our project.
In return, QHFZ-China gave Peking some advices to beautify their logo.
(4) BNU-China 2019
BNU-China helped us check our models and write codes in Matlab software, so that we got the preliminary image of the models. In addition, we also discussed how to organize and improve the parts, which makes our description more reasonable and more academic.
(5) Hong_Kong_UCCKE 2017 & 2019
The project of Hong_Kong_UCCKE 2017 was to design a bacterium to detect uric acid for diagnosis of hyperuricemia and gout. We sent an e-mail to contact Hong_Kong_UCCKE 2019 and got great help from their team leader Dorothy Wong, who was a member in Hong_Kong_UCCKE 2017. He gave us a lot of information in their experiment and human practices, which helped us avoid detours while promoting the project. Most importantly, they told us there probably was no suitable portable uric acid detecting device in Hong Kong, so what we did this year might be very important for people to pay attention to their serum uric acid level, which emphasized the meaning of our project.
(6) DLUT_China 2018
DLUT_China 2018 studied how to degrade uric acid to treat hyperuricemia and gout. We contacted their team leader, Zhien He. He and his team members gave us a lot of information about their experiments and human practices. They told us that because the incidence of hyperuricemia is not as high as that of high blood glucose and hypertension, few people studied gout treatment. Therefore, we should pay more attention to this field and make efforts. Besides, they introduced their design which made the bacteria in the digestive tract to secrete pig UOX. However, the effect is not ideal. Therefore, the design of cell therapy in body fluid is worth trying.
In addition, they shared the interview they did in a hospital in Dalian, which made us know the prevalence situation in Northeast coastal area of China.
(7) Future
[1] As we know from human practices and collaboration, effective public education about hyperuricemia and gout is very deficient. In a sense, to let everyone pay attention to the diseases is more important than detection and treatment. So, we want to unite every iGEM team that interested in the disease, as well as hospitals and biotechnology companies, to think out and carry out a popularization of science.
[2] We clearly realizes that eradicating the disease requires more work. So, if any team wants to go on studying, please contact us. We know the experience of teams which used to study the disease help us a lot. In return, our experience might help you avoid detours. Our mailbox is: "all AT ericthered DOT xyz"(Please change "AT" and "DOT" into "@" and "." ).
