Team:UNebraska-Lincoln/Human Practices

Education & Engagement

Lincoln Southeast High School

We attended Lincoln Southeast High School. We gave a presentation on our project and informed the students of an advanced chemistry class about synthetic biology and its applications in the iGEM competition. The students seemed increasingly engaged and asked a lot of insightful questions. In this way we were able to connect with the potential beneficiaries of our project and get input on how it might affect their lives in the future. We were also able to foster some level of interest in genetic engineering and synthetic biology, allowing for a new generation of iGEM teams.

Morrill Hall

The team took part in an annual science engagement activity at a local museum. On the day we visited, the museum was open to all families in the community free of charge, allowing young students to learn about various scientific fields and participate in many hands-on activities. We were given the opportunity to set up a booth where we informed the public about our project, in addition to setting up and experiment kids could take part in. We were able to teach them how to extract DNA from wheat germ using rubbing alcohol and dish detergent, which allowed them to see such a fundamental aspect of synthetic biology first-hand. (The "Education & Engagement" photo at the top of the page shows us in the museum.)

Human Practices

Bryan Lincoln General Hospital Infectious Disease Consultants

We met with Dr. Steven Rademacher and Dr. James Nora of the Infectious Disease Consultants at Bryan LGH. They provided their opinions on the practicality of our project in clinical applications. Both physicians were receptive to the application of our project in hospitals and clinics as an in vitro sterilization technique. They were also open to the development of the project into potential in vivo applications for Staphylococcal septicemia. Their thoughts solidified our goals for in vitro application and reemphasized the relevance and necessity of a MRSA treatment.

Dr. Greg Somerville

Dr. Somerville is an associate professor at the School of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at the University of Nebraska—Lincoln. He specializes in bacterial physiology and pathogenesis. We visited him near the beginning of the project to learn more about Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). He provided information about the threat of MRSA to the global community and the potential effectiveness of our project. Dr. Somerville indicated that MRSA is a growing threat in places where skin-to-skin contact is prevalent, such as hospitals and sports complexes. He explained that the spread of MRSA is on the rise and will be a serious threat to public health by 2050. He addressed our project as a potentially feasible idea and offered suggestions for improvement. Rather than our original goals of in vivo usage, Dr. Somerville believed in vitro applications would be more appropriate on the basis of safety and practicality. He also advised that our Gram-negative chassis, E. coli, may struggle to detect AIP. Since we were unable to work with a Gram-positive chassis, we developed a protocol to permeabilize the outer membrane of our cells. This was intended to enhance the ability of E. coli to detect AIP. More information about Dr. Somerville can be found here.

Address

University of Nebraska-Lincoln iGEM Team
634 Hamilton Hall
Lincoln, NE 68588-0304

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