Team:Shenzhen SFLS/Public Engagement

• Home
• Team
  • Members
  • Attributions
  • Collaboration
• Project
  • Inspiration & Description
  • Design
  • Improvements
  • Future Work
• Experiment
  • Protocol
  • Results
  • Notebooks
• Safety
• Human Practice
  • Human Practice&Integrated Human Practice
  • Education & Puclic Engagement
• Judging Form

Education & Puclic Engagement

WeChat official account

We established the account for our team in WeChat, which is used for introducing and contacting with the public. Sometimes, we posted some information about iGEM and the general process of our project. It helps the people in society communicate or share their ideas with us more conveniently. Here are some pictures about what we post below.

Published an article about synthetic biology and iGEM in school magazine

In October, we published an article named ‘the revolution of industry in biology is coming’ about synthetic biology and iGEM in SALT magazine.

SALT is the most successful publication in our school that all the articles or works are finished by students in Shenzhen Foreign Languages school and other 22 well-known high schools in Shenzhen as well. That is, it has been widely spread among students because of its high quality. In the article, we used vivid tone and also put some pictures of us doing the project of iGEM to introduce what synthetic biology aims to do and what iGEM competition is. Also, we talk about our project ‘Armour from the sea’ in it. We hope that it could arouse students' interest in synthetic biology and increase the popularity of iGEM.

LABs and presentation in Bao’an maternal and children hospital

After the summer vacation, we finished the rest of our experiment in the central laboratory in Bao'an maternal and children hospital, Shenzhen. Some of the researchers here are interested in what we are doing and are enthusiastic about advising on our project. To introduce our project more clearly, we delivered a small presentation about iGEM and our project detailly for them. After it, they gave us lots of suggestions about what we could improve in our project. The suggestions are as follows:

• 1.

  For the application, instead of using in daily life, you can think about what it can be used in clinical medicine.

• 2.

  Regarding the form of it, the form of freeze-dried powder is a good idea, because of its convenient preservation. Hospitals and relevant organizations can use it in clinical medicine, which is helpful for the patients.

• 3.

  If we have confusion about the model, they could give us some advice and support.

Forum in the Shenzhen Foreign Languages School (junior)

Before the National Day, four members from our team went to the Shenzhen Foreign Languages school middle school and delivered a speech for the students in junior high school of SFLS. The purpose of this presentation was to advertise iGEM and introduce some knowledge in the biology area. Before the speech, we advertised this activity among the classes. In the afternoon, as the time approached, many students came. We prepared this speech for a long time to finish the PowerPoint to make it more interesting and active. After the presentation, we provided a short time for the Q&A session. They joined the question-answer part actively.

After we introduced our product to them, they inquired us many things in the application of it, such as ‘Why the product is water-resisted?’ , ‘Why it can increase the skin recover rate?’, ‘Whether it could bring some bad effect to the skin？’ and so on. We answered them one by one and introduced more about our project. In order not to disturb their schedule later, we kept this speech in a proper time. We asked some students about how they feel about the speech. According to each of their reflections, although they had a vague idea of some biology terms, they have known more knowledge of synthetic biology through the presentation.

Forum in Shenzhen Foreign Languages Schools (senior)

Background:

Before the beginning of the new semester in September, some of the new enrolled students asked us about iGEM competition and showed great interest in taking part in a biology club, so we decided to hold a lecture about iGEM, which aimed to let them know more about synthetic biology. Also, we invited two other iGEM teams, SZU-CHINA and SYSU-CHINA, to present it together in Shenzhen Foreign Languages school. After two weeks of preparation, we finished it successfully since we also provided some of the small gifts for the audience, such as picture albums(SZU-CHINA), postcard(SYSU-CHINA), badge(Shenzhen_SFLS).

Detail:

On September 16th, we held a lecture about synthetic biology and iGEM with other two iGEM teams, SZU-CHINA and SYSU-CHINA. Before the start of the presentation, there are already lots of students asking about some details of iGEM and the process of our project. During the presentation, we introduced more details about iGEM and our project by vivid languages and PowerPoint to the students who are interested in science and seeking to take Partin iGEM competition next year.

Before our lecture, we also did a questionnaire for the students in Grade 10 and Grade 11 about synthetic biology and their cognization of some ideas in our projects, which is shown below. The result of it may be beneficial for us to prepare the materials that we need to present in the lecture. In the survey, we raised some questions about the application and whether they knew about some ways of using the biology material in our daily life. We found that, for the band-aid, most of the students used the form of bandage after hurting. Since they do not know other kinds of band-aid, which may not let us get feedback clearly from them, we introduced the other three types of band-aid, which were hydrogel, mist spray, wheel to them in the presentation.

The lecture included:

• 1.

  SZU-CHINA introduced RNA and microRNAs and their project, which is Micrancide.

• 2.

  SYSU-CHINA presented the concept of synthetic biology the their project ‘AdmiT: oncolytic Adenovirus with miRNA profile Targeted.'

• 3.

  Shenzhen_SFLS explain what iGEM and the project is.

After the presentation, we organized a short Q&A to answer questions from the audience. We also did the questionnaire again to investigate whether what we did help the students know more about iGEM and be more attracted to synthetic biology. The questionnaire was related to the concepts that we illustrated in the presentation. From the result of it, we were proud to see that they have more knowledge about synthetic biology. Also, we got some feedback from them to improve our project in the salon, which is after the Q&A sessions. In the questionnaire, a few of them present that the form of band-aid ‘hydrogel’ would cause ache when they used before.

member of SYSU-CHINA was presenting.

member of SZU-CHINA

members of Shenzhen_SFLS

Why we need to organize this forum?

First of all, since other clubs in our school has been finished the introduction of their club and interviewed their new members who enrolled in the new semester of 2019, our team members wanted to show up our club and the team iGEM, so that it wouldn’t let them miss the chance of finding the new enrolled students who have real interest in the area of biology. After the meeting with the student association union in our school, we decided to hold a lecture for the purpose of creating a way to let them know something more about synthetic biology and the competition iGEM.

Salon after the lecture

After the forum, we have a 20-minutes salon with those students who are interested in iGEM and want to take part in such an amazing scientific team and competition while we are having drinks, The aim of it was to help them know more profound thoughts of our projects and iGEM. Besides, we gave the replies of some in-depth questions privately. They were curious about the method of producing protein and experience of iGEMers’ lab lives. At the end of our discussion, they are amazed that we could use our knowledge about gene engineering to create new parts by ourselves. We also set up a WeChat group to talk with the new enrolled Grade 10 students to set up next year's iGEM team of our school, which is an easy way for them to know more conveniently.

Report on Questionnaire

To investigate student’s cognition state and acceptance level on Synthetic Biology, we set up this questionnaire. It includes eight questions, which consist of essential background as well as a series of surveys on Synthetic Biology and biological glue. A total of 623 questionnaires were collected in this survey.

The following questions are not in the same order as those in the questionnaire but are preferably sorted by relevancy.

1. Basic information statistics

Question 1: grade distribution

Question 2: awareness on iGEM

From these charts, we could see that our responders are distributed in various grades, and the sample size is relatively large, reaching 623 students. Therefore, this survey has certain universality and representativeness.

According to the feedback, students almost do not have a deep understanding of iGEM. Therefore, we decided to introduce it in our school lecture.

2. Student awareness of Synthetic Biology

Question 3: Self Evaluation on Knowledge level of Synthetic Biology

According to the histogram, we can obviously see that many students do not understand synthetic biology very well. As a result of the grade 10 students not studying synthetic biology, and grade 11 students only stepping a little into it due to the textbooks. Grade 10 and grade 11 students in our school are not familiar with synthetic biology. In conclusion, we decided to give a pellucid speech with few technical terms to them.

Question 4: Are you interested in Synthetic Biology?

From the pie chart, it is clear to see that most of the students(69%) are interested in synthetic biology. As biology is one of the subjects that have excellent prospects, a part of students show a great interest in it and seek to know more about it, which has become one of the motivations for us to hold a forum about synthetic biology.

Question 5: Do you support the research on Synthetic Biology?

According to the result, about 89% of students hope that synthetic biology could be helpful to our society and has excellent prospects while others hold the neutral idea.

Question 6: Do you know biological adhesive?

From this question, we aim to know the cognition of biological glue among the students in our senior high school. According to the result, we could find that most of them have not heard about it, so we want to introduce some concepts of biological glue in our presentation.

Question 7: Do you like to use biological adhesive?

In this question, we wanted to know about whether our product would be used if it can be released in the future, in other words, if it could satisfy human demand.

From the pie chart shown. It is clear to see that most of the students had the desire to use it while a few of them still has a concern about the effect of it.

Question 8: Which type of biological adhesive product do you like?

In this question, we wonder which type of band-aid could satisfy the public most. According to the results shown, tape type is the most popular form of band-aid, due to the frequent use in our daily life.

Club Day

This year, we took part in Club Day twice in our junior high school and received many results through a questionnaire that we have distributed on that day. Before the first Club Day, we designed our team clothes, emblems which are related to our product. What is more, we prepared some small gift like a biology-related postcard for the students in our school. When the day came, lots of students came to our stall to buy the gifts and ask information about the iGEM. What made us happy is that many students were willing to spend some time finishing our questionnaires. From this answer we got, we did some change in the basic idea of the product. Also, we provided a QR code, which is related to our team’s WeChat public account on the desk. On that, we put some progress of our project and some information about iGEM and synthetic biology to let people know our team.

Before the second Club Day, we made some mediums in the lab and brought to school once we got the permission from the school. We sold them as the goods during Club Day, and they attracted some students to come and know more detail about our club. Most of the students were curious about our goods, so they asked after we explained how to use the culture medium, we also introduced iGEM information more detailly to them by the way.

This picture showed the arrangement of clubs in the club day.

We were in the first row.

Results of survey

the first club day(5.22)

The Club Day gave us a chance to provide questionnaires to the students. We gave each student who came to our table a questionnaire. The pattern above shows the grade distribution of participating students.

We also put another question in our survey, which is related to the application of our project. The result of it has been shown on the website of Integrated human practice(https://2019.igem.org/Team:Shenzhen_SFLS/Human_Practices).

the second club day(10.10)

Student opinions on Biological Adhesive

Question 6: which kind of following means you use when you have flesh wound

From the diagram, we can see that using band-aid has been the most common way that the public used after hurting; that is, band-aid has become one of the necessities in our daily life.

Question 7: What are the purposes for the current methods dealing with flesh wound

In this question, we mainly wanted to find our which characterization the band-aid has would satisfy the public. We have presented the six widespread use of band-aid in the options.

According to the results, it shows that the public thinks that the band-aid should have the features of preventing re-injuring, stopping bleeding, and resisting infection, which is the point that we would focus on for further searching.

Question 8: What are your expectations for those of methods dealing with flesh wound

In this question, we aimed to get the idea of ideal band-aid from the public. According to the result of it, they thought that resist inflection may be the most expected feature of band-aid. Our project would do more search and ask relevant experts about the methods to achieve this goal.

Conclusion on all questions we distributed

Though opinions could not be judged, many people engaged with this research lack of knowledge in biological adhesive, not to mention the synthetic biology as a subject. From this, we believe it is better to give lectures or write articles based on this topic to spread necessary knowledge, and this is why we held a school lecture, which would be mentioned in our next part of Human Practice.