Team:Czech Republic/Attributions
Attributions
THE IOD BAND IDEA is really a mix of two amazing concepts used by nature to engineer new cells: sexual conjugation and pheromone based signalling. Starting from the very first iGEM discussions in winter, the team has been fascinated by these systems and from the get-go wanted to use them to do amazing engineering. It so happened that during some unofficial yet regular beer-meetings with students and researchers from the Biomedical centre the problem of CTC diagnosis was raised. It did not take long before input-output blocks from engineering courses became IODs that work together to solve complex problems, such as diagnosis of CTCs.
THE TEAM includes a mix of complementary expertise. In the end the work was naturally split between the members. It goes without saying that these wiki pages are primarily the work of all team members with constant language corrections and comments on content clarity coming from the advisors and instructors. Below each member of the larger team is linked to their identifying tasks.
Jan Bejvl is a student at the Faculty of Medicine. He brought to the group a wealth of information regarding medical practice. In the lab he started off with the Interlab study and then played an integral role in Module 2 recloning plasmids and setting up the final assays.
Martin Cienciala is a bachelor student at the Charles University in Prague in the Molecular Biology program. He co-developed the idea behind location tags in Module 3 and designed as well as performed all the microfluidic experiments. Martin led the assembly, induction, and experimental validation of surface receptor antibodies.
Hynek Kasl was responsible for Module 1. He assembled the MATa and MATx synthetic loci, the reporter plasmids and the corresponding biobricks. Throughout the project he became sort of the team modeling and data guru providing supportive models for the CeCe simulator hydrodynamics and diffusion extensions. In Human Practices, Hynek presented the early IOD band concept to young engineering students.
Veronika Kolejáková studies Molecular Biology at the Charles University in Prague. She co-developed the idea behind location tags in Module 3 and assisted with our Human Practices progress. Veronika performed experiments to ensure yeast surface antibody production and assisted with experiments in other Modules.
Jiří Louda is a student at the department of Cybernetics. Early on he helped with the Interlab study. Subsequently he played a supportive roles in different modules as needed.
Filip Nemčko is a bachelor student at the Faculty of Sciences at Charles University in Prague. Filip provided valuable knowledge and ideas during the development of the concept of our project and the design of Module 3. He performed yeast display validating experiments. In Module 1, Filip contributed to the construction of the synthetic haploid strains.
Václav Pelíšek extended the CeCe simulator with features crucial for IOD simulations: stochastic reactions, cell-cell communication and agglutination. He did all work on coding wiki design into HTML and CSS and fabricated the microfludic chips. Václav assisted during the Interlab Study experiments and with the lab's maintenance.
Anna Sosnová was responsible for modul 2. She performed cloning, BioBrick construction and validation of the constructed parts. She was also responsible for performing the Interlab Study including construction of devices, measurements and processing of data. Anna also coordinated our collaboration with team Chalmers Gothenburg. In Human Practices, Anna was responsible for expert consultations and interviews.
THE ADVISORS kept the work on track and helped answer the tough questions. They also checked wiki pages related to their field of expertise.
Jiří Fatka is the original author of the CeCe simulator and was instrumental in helping Hynek and Václav understand the simulator architecture and possibilities for extension. Jiří was also helpful in solving some complex HTML and CSS problems on wiki.
Pavel Fikar taught the students basics of microfludics and showed them how to use specialized equipment. He is author of the team pictures.
Kateřina Pěchotová is the Georgiev Lab manager and so was instrumental in double checking experimental setups and making sure the lab was constantly supplied with petri dishes, media, enzymes, … and the list goes on.
Tereza Puchrová familiarised Hynek and Filip in Module 1 with the determination of mating types in S. cerevisiae. Her experience with yeast genome data also proved useful in debugging the design of the synthetic MATa and MATx loci.
Pavel Zach was the main advisor of the team. He made sure all the deadlines are met and the loose ends are closed. He supervised the Biobrick construction and submission. In addition, he provided literature and advice regarding chimeric receptors and synthetic pheromones.
THE INSTRUCTORS were closely involved keeping the message clear and the team on track to reaching the goals.
Assist. Professor Daniel Georgiev as our leader keeps the great mood in the lab and his accurate questions leads everyone to the result without any need for explanation.
Assoc. Professor Eduard Janeček provided tremendous organizational support for our team throughout the duration.
THE EXTERNAL HELP was help indeed providing advice, human practice support, and occasionally even an autoclave or a spare supply of a ligase.
We would like to thank the 'Biomedical Centre, Faculty of Medicine in Pilsen, Charles University for first of all participating in our GMO survey. Namely we would also like to thank Assist. Prof. Lucie Vištejnová' for letting us use the centre autoclave when ours went bust, for spotting us some ligase when ours was backordered, and for helping us collect all the surveys. We would like to also thank Dr. Pavel Pitule and Dr. Pavel Ostašov for sharing their experience with CTC diagnosis and for giving us helpful advice on how to improve our experiments to get better data.
Thanks to all our colleagues at the Faculty of Applied Sciences for their support during our research. Special thanks belongs to Prof. Miloš Schlegel for opening up his Introduction to Cybernetics course for an hour allowing us to present our project and synthetic biology to engineers.
Finally, we want to thank team Chalmers Gothenburg for initiating the GMO survey, processing and evaluating the data and useful advice they provided us during our collaboration.