Difference between revisions of "Team:Oxford/Experiments"

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                     <h2 style="text-align:left">Introduction</h2>
 
                     <h2 style="text-align:left">Introduction</h2>
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                    <p>
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                        Our enzymatic approach to the treatment of urinary tract infections (UTIs) is centred on the design of a "pathogen killing" engineered microbial host containing three key features:
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                        <ul>
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                            <li>Constant secretion of biofilm-degrading enzymes - degrading the biofilms of the pathogenic bacteria reduces their resistance towards antibiotics</li>
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                            <li>Production and intracellular accumulation of enzymes that can kill both the pathogenic bacteria and our engineered microbial host upon release into the extracellular medium</li>
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                            <li>A quorum sensing mechanism that triggers the release of the antibacterial enzymes in the presence of pathogenic bacteria</li>
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                        </ul>
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                    </p>
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                    <p>
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                        Through our experimental work with secretion assays, biofilm assays, and cell-killing assays we were able to obtain preliminary data suggesting that the <a href="https://2015.igem.org/Team:Oxford/Parts">BioBrick parts</a> which we designed to allow our microbial host to produce the relevant biofilm-degrading enzymes and bacteria-killing enzymes are indeed able to function as expected individually.
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                 </div>
 
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Revision as of 02:23, 10 November 2015

Experiments

Introduction

Our enzymatic approach to the treatment of urinary tract infections (UTIs) is centred on the design of a "pathogen killing" engineered microbial host containing three key features:

  • Constant secretion of biofilm-degrading enzymes - degrading the biofilms of the pathogenic bacteria reduces their resistance towards antibiotics
  • Production and intracellular accumulation of enzymes that can kill both the pathogenic bacteria and our engineered microbial host upon release into the extracellular medium
  • A quorum sensing mechanism that triggers the release of the antibacterial enzymes in the presence of pathogenic bacteria

Through our experimental work with secretion assays, biofilm assays, and cell-killing assays we were able to obtain preliminary data suggesting that the BioBrick parts which we designed to allow our microbial host to produce the relevant biofilm-degrading enzymes and bacteria-killing enzymes are indeed able to function as expected individually.