Team:VIT Vellore/Collaborations
Our collobarations with other colleges
NYU Abu Dhabi
On 22nd June three members of our team, Soundaram Veerappan, Sahana Venkatesh and Anisha Thite, visited NYU Abu Dhabi to meet their iGEM team. Our members interacted with the NYU-AD team and we explained our projects to each other. While brain-storming for collaborations they gave us information to start our mathematical modeling equations and more tips on improving our project. In turn we also provided them with some information on the type of system they could use for their project.
Oxford
As people with very little experience in mathematical modelling, modelling our system was an incredible learning experience and Team Oxford was a big part of it. They suggested we use MATLAB instead of Simbiology for plotting the ordinary differential equations because we weren't able to select the correct kinetic growth model in Simbiology. Minakshi Ashok from team Oxford was very helpful throughout the entire process to communicate with us every week via Skype. Oxford verified our equations and gave us feedback helping us debug and optimize our code. The curves we obtained initially were exponentially increasing which was not desirable. Oxford suggested us to use the logistic growth-oriented model and we proceeded with that as the backbone of our equation and we added the required rate constants. While solving differential equations we faced a lot of difficulties in integrating them due the complex nature of the equations. Using Euler's model was the solution Oxford presented to us. We went on to use Euler's model and develop our model.r code.
KCL
We helped them edit codes for their Wiki page. We also filled up their bio-security standards survey. The survey aimed to assess the bio-security protocols adopted in iGEM labs and to evaluate the bio-security protocols and trainings iGEM teams have access to. Respondents from our team shared about the bio-security standards in our University labs.
All India iGEM Meetup - IISER Bhopal
The All India iGEM Meet 2019 was organized on 20th and 21st July in IISER Bhopal. We sent two representatives from Team VIT Vellore, Raghav Mehta and Tanmay Talwalkar. The program started at 9:30am and our team was the third to present after IISER Kolkata and Sastra University. We gave our presentation (Therapeutics against resistant bacterial infection) and answered all the judges’ questions. We had our poster presentation succeeding the presentations, and we won the ‘Best Poster’ award.
Going to Bhopal for the meet was a very enriching experience. We met and interacted with the teams from India participating in iGEM, and made contacts with the people who would be attending the Giant Jamboree. After the first day, when all of the presentations and posters were judged, we had informal interaction time, or “fun shenanigans” as the IISER Bhopal team called it. There were games and a bad ad hoc presentation, and at the end we left the university tired but fulfilled.
ETH Zurich
For our mathematical modelling, we used a constant term which indicates the 'Average Burst size of bacteriophage. Since Team Zurich was working with phages, they were able to provide us with experimental values of O.D. and Plaque Forming Unit/mL. Using these values, we calculated the 'Burst Size' of their phage which came out to be 250. We went on to use this value for our modelling the viral growth curve.
TU Eindhoven
We drafted a hypothetical proposal as to how both our projects could complement each other. This helped us understand each other’s projects better to come up with a potential solution as to how a merger of both our systems could outdo each of our’s individually. We formed a draft of how team VIT Vellore’s antisense RNA system could be used as a detector of antibiotic resistance, bringing TU Eindhoven’s system into play if resistance is detected. The system of team TU Eindhoven would then emit luminescence, occurring in the samples only where antibiotic resistance is detected. In these samples the lytic cycle of the phages would be activated according to VIT Vellore’s system, and the increasing number of daughter phages in the subsequent cycle could be detected by TU Eindhoven’s dCas9 sensor.
TJUSLS China
Team TJUSLS China sent us some questions (doubts) they had with regard to screening methods for beta-lactamase inhibitors and some general questions about the working mechanism of phage therapy. We got them in touch with Dr. Ponnari Gottipati, one of our symposium speakers and put forth the questions by team TJUSLS_China to her during the symposium. Dr. Gottipati shared her insights into the questions asked. Team TJUSLS_China helped us gather responses for our antibiotic-resistance awareness survey where we aimed to gather information about the extent of awareness about the problem of antibiotic resistance among people from different fields. Team TJUSLS_China helped us gather some responses from students in their college.
SASTRA Thanjavur
Team SASTRA has introduced a magazine named 'Primers' which is an educational and scientific magazine aimed at focusing scientific interest towards important issues. We were able to collaborate and contribute to their cause by writing an article which was added to their magazine. Our article addressed the issue of antibiotic resistance with a real time example referring to the ban by Indian government on Colistin usage for livestock. The article also talked about Abdul Ghaffur's research works with which helped this movement gain more momentum and an inference was made that tackling the epidemic of antimicrobial resistance will require a joint effort of scientific evidence, social pressure as well as big decisions from policy makers. Team SASTRA's reach really helped the cause of spreading awareness about this issue and gave us a platform to reach out.
Hamburg
We sent them our project’s abstract in easy-to-understand language since the main aim of the ‘iGEM World map’ collaboration was to make iGEM truly open source so that the common public (people from non-science backgrounds) could also be able to interpret and understand the fascinating projects done by iGEM teams across the globe. We drafted and sent our abstract describing our project as per simple guidelines provided by team Hamburg to be added to their world map.
uOttawa
We uploaded our protocols to their ‘Virtual Protocol Donation Box’. The purpose was to facilitate sharing of protocols and in turn, knowledge among various iGEM teams and that protocols from various iGEM teams are made easily available to view and try.
IISER Kolkata
We filled up their survey on Kala Azar (Leishmaniasis). The survey aimed to serve as a potential platform for team IISER Kolkata to understand the extent of awareness about the disease around the globe. We shared our views about the disease, its causes and effects according to our knowledge on the same and also shared the treatment strategies undertaken and options available in India to tackle the disease that we were aware of.
MITADTBIO Pune
Our team filled up their survey on analyzing the menstrual waste crisis. They wished to assess the level of awareness regarding menstrual waste in countries across the globe. We answered some questions on how we prefer to discard used menstrual pads and also shared our opinions on the disposal methods that should be implemented to dispose off menstrual waste. We also shared our knowledge on some government schemes implemented in India for menstrual hygiene.
Lambert
We filled up their survey on bead homogenizers. We shared our opinion on how underprivileged communities would benefit from a frugal bead homogenizer and also our personal views as to how their low-cost bead homogenizer OpenCell would benefit the community and research labs.
Moscow
We filled up their survey on tick-borne diseases. We shared our insights on the tick-borne infections that we knew of and the methods to detect the tick-borne infections that we were aware of. We also shared our opinions on their biosensor that team Moscow is engineering.
Strasbourg
We filled up their survey on food allergens. The survey was carried out to assess the impact and incidence of allergies in different countries. We shared the type of food allergies our team members suffer from and the effects of those allergies. We also shared the kind of allergens our respondent team members react to.
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