Team:FAU Erlangen/Tour11
Team
We are the first iGEM team from the Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nuremberg. The participation was initiated by three students of the Master's program Cell and Molecular Biology: Adrian, Filip and Sabrina. Fascinated by the idea, five additional students joined the team. Following their lead, the instructors Prof. Uwe Sonnewald and PhD student Marlene Pröschel of the Division of Biochemistry (Department of Biology) were convinced to support us. Early during our planning process we decided to use the model organism of S. cerevisiae, which brought us together with Prof. Christian Koch of the Division of Biochemistry.
Who are we?
PI
- Prof. Uwe Sonnewald
Professor Dr. Uwe Sonnewald is the head of the Division of Biochemistry. He turned out to be the first person to support our iGEM vision. Giving us our lab spaces and getting the Department of Biology behind our project was an enormous help to us. Regularly, he checks up on us to ask if everything is going all right. In addition, he helped us with lab materials and financially. Through Professor Sonnewald we had the chance to work with Marlene Pröschel, who was a huge help in the lab. At the moment his main research is concentrated at the Plant Biochemistry and Biotechnology group. These groups investigate the regulation of the primary metabolism of plants and try to improve biotechnological approaches of crops.
Instructor
- Marlene Pröschel
Marlene Pröschel, a PhD student in the Division of Biochemistry, introduced us to the different labs and surroundings. She was our go to person when it came to any questions, whether they were theoretical or practical. Moreover, she lent us a hand in the lab on some occasions.
Advisor
- Prof. Christian Koch
Professor Dr. Christian Koch of the Division of Biochemistry was our specialist when it came to yeast knowledge. While always staying interested as well as enthusiastic, he also provided us with more lab space and materials. Prof. Koch's never ending expertise gave us great insight to homologous recombination, promotors, plasmids and literature. At the moment his main research is concentrated at the Fungal Cell Biology group. They examine the regulators of cell division of Saccharomyces cerevisiae and the interaction of phytopathogenic fungi with their host.
Undergraduate Team Members
Sabrina is our organizational talent who always manages to keep a level head. Through excelling in getting everything/everyone together she figuratively became our humanized Multi-SpyCatcher! However, she also finds time to put some great effort into our wiki page. In addition to her organizational tasks she takes on some voluntary work in higher educational politics as well as clubs. Sabrina was born and raised in Augsburg, Germany and came to the FAU in 2011. At the present, she is finishing her Master's program in Cell and Molecular Biology. |
Adrian plays a major part in many fields: finding sponsors, research, lab work – simply everything! During all these things he stays in a positive mood and keeps his controlled chaos in check, even though sometimes this postive mood swings into desperation – which seems to be the norm for lab work. In his free time he often visits Ireland and the open ocean, even if only mentally. Adrian was born in Erlangen and raised in Kempten and came to the FAU in 2010. Right now he does his masters program in Cell and Molecular Biology. |
Vlady isn't very noticeable, but he is always present. During lab work he remains calm and never loses his deep concentration or his share of pessimism. Since he enjoys correcting other people's mistakes, he gets the task of improving our occasionally subpar English writing. He contributes to our interdisciplinary team, having acquired his B.Sc. in Integrated Life Sciences and currently attending the masters program in Cell and Molecular Biology. Vlady was born and raised in Kiew, Ukraine, moved to Germany in 2003, and enrolled at the FAU in 2011. |
Nadine is a bright and perpetually cheerful little live wire. Apart from finding sponsors and doing voluntary work at the animal shelter, she always has the time to work in the lab. To the great delight of us all (the advisors, instructors, TAs and the team of course), she always brings us homemade treats! Without her, we definitely would be pushing our limits with too much caffeine and too little food. Nadine was born and raised in Nuremberg, Germany and came to the FAU in 2011. Right now she is attending the Master's program in Cell and Molecular Biology. |
Frederike is – similar to Vlady – a rather quiet soul. She observes every detail meticulously, helps us with finding sponsors and does a whole metric ton of cloning! Contrary to us all, she manages to never give up and sink back in despair during lab work. After a stressfull lab day she still finds some energy left, which she uses at the volleyball field. She was born in Schweinfurt, Germany, raised in Hammelbrug, Germany and came to the FAU in 2011, where she does her masters program in Cell and Molecular Biology. |
Ezgim, who studies Biology B.Sc. in the 2nd term, is our youngest member of the team. She was born and raised in Frankenthal (Pfalz), Germany, took a semester abroad to Pennsylvania, US, in high school and came to the FAU in 2013. Since she doesn't have much lab experience her main assignment was finding sponsors and helping with the wiki, especially the translating part of it. During her free time she loves to travel all around the world. The iGEM competition truly opened her up to the impressive field of biochemistry. |
Filip always keeps a level head when it comes to designing and organizing sequences. Fortunately, he has his own peculiar brand of humor to keep us relaxed. His work is always excellent, although we quickly learned not to expect it – or him - on time. However, he has a great method in covering that up with his contagious confidence. Being one of the founders of the iGEM FAU Erlangen team, he plays an important role in our group. Just like Vlady, he did his B. Sc. In Integrated Life Sciences and is now doing his masters program in Cell and Molecular Biology. He was born and raised in Kraków, Poland, moved to Germany in 2000, and came to the FAU in 2011. |
Günter is our own personal physicist, after recruiting him for some previously planned project involving some analysis using physical measurement methods. As a physicist, he was mainly there to point out explanations for sponsors and non-biology audiences that were too complicated to understand. He was also responsible for all kind of programming and computing. One of his programming results was a short Python script that we used to find short sequences with a specified length that do not or as little as possible appear in a given genome. During his work he always remains the epitome of organization. He even managed to understand our biological goals and tasks in a surprisingly short time. When he is not programming, he spends his free time at standard formation dancing and voluntary work in higher educational politics. He was born in Duderstadt, lower Saxony, Germany and raised in Landshut, Bavaria, Germany and came to the FAU in 2011. |