Team:Tufts/Results

Results

Conjugation of Shewanella

Ultimately we were able to grow a culture of Shewanella with our plasmid

  • After conjugation, we found colonies on all 5 chloramphenicol plates, including the non-resistant control. Therefore we could not conclude that our strain had taken up the plasmid
  • However after another day of growth, we found colonies on the 25 chloramphenicol plate that we had conjugated in a solution, but not the one that we'd pelleted during conjugation.
  • As there are no colonies on the control, we can confirm that our Shewanella took up the plasmid

Transformed Shewanella on Chloramphenicol 25- colonies prove that the plasmid has been taken up

Control plate on Chloramphenicol 25- no growth

Shewanella that was conjugated in a pellet- no growth, suggests Shewanella is more effectively conjugated in a solution than a pellet

Project Achievements

This year we found a project that was both promising, and that excited our team. However due to lack of availability and our teammates' busy schedules, we didn't manage to get as far as we'd liked.

  • We managed to design plasmids similar to that used in Cornell 2012 that could be used to detect different analytes
  • The plasmid was successfully introduced into a strand of Shewanella through conjugation, after unsuccessful attempts at electroporation.

The continuation of this project is to test the function of these plasmids by measuring the voltages, and further improving the function of this biological sensor.