Team:DTU-Denmark/Team
Introduction
Everything started with an iGEM meeting in January, facilitated by our supervisor Chris Workman. From then on our team met weekly and several sessions of idea generation followed -It was two of our members, Mads and Pernille, who finally came up with our project idea. Many months of project planning, fundraising, lab work and coding followed. All this work was performed by our team members. Still, we wouldn’t have made it this far without the support and guidance from all the people involved.
We would like to thank our advisors who assisted us during the whole project and have provided invaluable advice and feedback. We would also express our thanks to everyone else who has supported us over the course project, be it with sharing their expertise or providing facilities and materials. A full list of acknowledgements can be seen below.
The Team
The DTU iGEM Team 2015 is composed of a group of eleven motivated DTU students dedicated to exploring and sharing their passion for science. Several team members are highly engaged in internationally recognized research groups ranging from DTU Center for Biological Sequence Analysis to the Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Bio-sustainability, and leading biotech companies, as part of their education.
The team includes both bachelor and master’s students and combines a diverse background of biochemistry, molecular biology, bioinformatics, entrepreneurship, and pharmaceutical engineering, in the shared goal of providing significant achievements within the field of synthetic biology. Thus, the group possesses a unique combination of valuable competences, comprising skills in molecular biology, biochemistry, mathematical modeling, scientific programming, project management, and communication.
The team strives to communicate these achievements and spread the general acceptance and accessibility of synthetic biology-based technology throughout the scientific community and general society. Furthermore, the team will focus on stimulating the interest of young minds to pursue an education within the realm of science, e.g. by hosting events and writing articles about synthetic biology in different general scientific forums.
Merging minds
Teambuilding with Canoing event followed by Cards Against Humanity.
Members
Mads Anderson
MSc Bioinformatics and Systems Biology (2nd year)
Software and project developer
I am a second year MSc student in Bioinformatics and Systems Biology at DTU. On the iGEM team I am developing the Wiki Wizard and together with Pernille responsible for the overall planning of the project. During my studies I have been one of the lead developers on the oligo designer MODEST and the lymphocyte structure modelling tool LYRA. After iGEM I am going to do my master's thesis in lentiviral vectors at Aarhus University.
Linkedin Profile
Pernille Myers
MSc Bioinformatics and Systems Biology, honors (1st year)
Project leader/developer
When Pernille came home from her vacation in July nothing so far had really suceeded in our lab. She got things turned around and made our first BioBrick in less than a week. When Pernille is not in the lab; she fancies biking or jogging to Novozymes to do more lab work and travelling. Her most memorable trip was living in California, where she did research for a biotech company, or perhaps when she was invited to the Noble Prize Award Ceremony because of her project on brown bananas.
Scott Myers
Scott is the team's protein chemist and the most excotic member of the team (he is from California). After his bachelor in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from University of California, Davis, Scott got a job in protein chemistry at a Danish biotech company. After seven years, he decided to move to Denmark to finish his masters in Biotechnology at DTU. Being the most through person in the lab, Scott is in charge of important experiments, purifications, analysis, and proofreading all text on the wiki as he basicly has a minor in English. He was also in charge of our BioBrick tutorial for the other Danish iGEM teams. Outside school he enjoys soccer, ultimate, brewing beer, and more soccer.
Vilhelm Krarup Møller
BSc Biotechnology (2nd year)
Project Coordinator
Vilhelm is among the team members who have spent most of the time in the lab –he even brought his private coffee cup to university in summer. He always came up with new ideas to pursue as part of our Human Practice strategy and always knew what to discuss at our next meeting. Furthermore he has contributed in the long process of making us an official Blue Dot project at DTU. He is planning to specialize in the field of bioinformatics and wants to do his thesis at the Center of Biological Sequence Analysis at DTU. When he takes a break from working on iGEM, he enjoys running and some more science.
Michael Poulsen
MSc student in Pharmaceutical Design and Engineering: at Danish Technical University. Great chef for the everlasting need of lunch.
Michael works as the little helper around most parts, what ever its in the lab, at the office or other tasks, a helping hand is never far away
Tobias Løvgren Madsen
MSc Pharmaceutical Design and Engineering (2nd year)
Head of H&R and Project Coordinator
Tobias is a life-saver for most of the team members. He kept track of the fundraising, organises our social events, and designed our board to keep track of ongoing activites in the lab and on the project. Tobias also has the fantastic ability to always be happy and bring beers to event. When he went to China for month to study public communications, there was no Friday beer. Besides all the organisational work, Tobias studies Pharmacutical Design and Engineering, where he focusses on entrepenuership and project development.
Verena Volf
MSc Biotechnology (2nd year)
Verena is a hardworking team member always prepared to attend the next meeting! She has been in charge of practicalities way ahead of the rest of the team ensuring facilities for every situation. An example of her commitment is her attendence at the BioBusiness Summer School 2015 at the Copenhagen Businees School to get a wider perspective of our policy and practice.
I am a 2nd year Master student in Biotechnology. I joined the iGEM team to experience all stages of a scientific project and have been involved in different areas of the project, from organizing the BioBricks tutorial, labwork and taking care of practicalities. In my free time I enjoy bouldering, jogging as well as traveling and learning Danish.
Viktor Hesselberg-Thomsen
BSc Biotechnology (1st year)
Laboratory researcher
Viktor is not like most freshmen's in college. He has already won a young research competition and on the DTU iGEM team 2015 he has been working hard mastering new methods in the laboratory from the first day. Viktor has done a lot of the lab work; and he was the first to suceed on the team at making our chassis Bacillus competent. Outside the lab, Viktor plays in a jazz band and then he would like to specialise in algae research.
Karolina Kalbarczyk
MSc Pharmaceutical Design and Engineering student (2nd year)
Having a wide range of interests, being on the iGEM team was a perfect opportunity for Karolina to combine some of her passions like her interest in synthetic biology, innovative start-ups and sharing knowledge in an international team. Originally from Poland, she has already a lot of international experience, having lived in Germany, England and now Denmark. Karolina was not only involved in our human practice activities, but also holds the record for the highest DNA concentrations in miniprepping.
Linas Kaminskas
High School Students
Nikolaj
Thea
Thea is currently doing her last year of High School, with a focus on Biotechnology, Chemistry, Math and English. Her primary goal of participating in the project has been learning as much as she could. By helping in the lab, she has had the opportunity to discover new methods, and gain confidence in applying methods with which she was already familiar. When she’s not in class or in the lab listening to the relentless sound of the nanodrop machine, she spends the few moments she has left either playing or listening to music with friends.
Maja
Advisors and Supervisors
Christopher Workman
Associate professor, Ph.D.,
Regulatory genomics,
DTU System Biology
Chris is the team's main instructor who has put together the team and has given advice from the beginning with brainstorming project ideas until now that the project nears its completion.
Jan Martinussen
Associate professor, Ph.D.,
Metabolic signalling and regulation,
DTU Systems Biology
Jan has been a great help with theoretical and practial work in the laboratory especially with his knowledge on gram-negative bacteria. He and Jan have also made their laboratory available for our team to use. We are grateful for the help he has given us with planning of experiments and the practial implementation.
Mogens Kilstrup
Associate professor, Ph.D.
Metabolic signalling and regulation,
DTU Systems Biology
Mogens has been a great help with theoretical and practial work in the laboratory especially with his knowledge on gram-negative bacteria. He and Jan have also made their laboratory available for our team to use. We are grateful for the help he has given us with planning of experiments and the practial implementation.
Acknowledgements
Initial project phase
- Previous year’s iGEM team members Anne Sophie Laerke Hansen, Kristian Barrett and Kristian Jensen joined us during our first meetings, shared their experience and advice and helped us get going with our idea generation by introducing us to brainstorming techniques
- Faculty members of DTU Systems Biology Morten Sommer, Thomas Ostenfeld Larsen and Rasmus John Normand Frandsen gave feedback on our initial ideas
- Johannes Lundin Brockdorff gave feedback on our fund application draft
Human practice and BioBrick tutorial
- Malene Bonné Meyer facilitated the contact with the high school students
- Regina Schürmann kindly provided us laboratory facilities during the BioBrick workshop
- Kristian Davidsen was a great help during the BioBrick tutorial, helping both in the lab and answering questions concerning the tutorial.
- Mette Hansen introduced us to different communication channels… which has helped us to define a strategy for streamlining our outreach intiatives as well as choosing our target group
Laboratory support
- Marzanna Pulka-Amin introduced us to the laboratory equipment
Art and Design
- Mads Møller Madsen from PF foto took pictures of our team
- Logo
Sponsors
The Lundbeck Foundation is an active industrial foundation established in 1954. Its main objective is to maintain and expand the activities of the Lundbeck Group, and to provide funding for scientific research of the highest quality.
Otto Mønsted Fund's main objective is to contribute to the development of Danish trade and industry. Within this overall framework, the Board has established detailed guidelines on funding for research and educational purposes within the technical scientific and commercial disciplines.
SnapGene offers the fastest and easiest way to plan, visualize, and document molecular biology procedures. SnapGene has been an essential tool for the DTU iGEM 2015 team! "With the use of the SnapGene tools our work has been remarkable easier with its great features." Victor DTU iGEM 2015.
VWR supports its customers through a combination of product choices, operational excellence and differentiated services to improve its customers' productivity from research to production. For DTU iGEM 2015 they made a difference.
Frisenette is a Danish company which manufactures and markets we filters, filtration equipment, and glass and plastic consumables for laboratories. DTU iGEM 2015 highly recommend their products.
In Vitro's biggest ambition is to contribute locally, by creating a company in development that creates jobs, and the job, the environment and good customer experience is in focus. In Vitro helped our team with consumables and we can only recommend their service.
Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. is the world leader in serving science. Their mission is to enable our customers to make the world healthier, cleaner and safer. We are greatful for their contribution to our team.
With more than 1,400 international patents, the AKG® brand has been delivering the powerful, undistorted sound that music professionals have relied on for more than 60 years, consistently producing some of the truest and most natural-sounding headphones and microphones in the history of audio. Their contribution made it possible to present our product as we wished on our terms!
With a corporate slogan 'Humanizing Genomics' Macrogens vision is to become the "Leader of Asian Biotech industry" with new medicine development capabilities based on race-specific "medical treatment/gene information integrated content. Thank you Macrogen for your contribution!