Team:NRP-UEA-Norwich/Collaborations
Collaborations
Collaboration is an important part of the iGEM competition. We worked with three different 2015 iGEM teams to achieve different goals.
Valencia (UPV) team
The Valencia (UPV) team are also working on plants. (Together with the Cambridge team we will be participating in the Plant Workshop at the Giant Jamboree).
We also received plant parts from Valencia-UPV, which we tested in the plant chassis, Nicotiana tabacum, in a transient assay. We recorded the result using confocal microscopy. We also sent them the ‘MoClo Flipper Constructs’ made by the NRP-UEA iGEM 2014 team, allowing them to easily convert their GoldenGate parts to standardised BioBricks. The Valencia-UPV team helped us by testing our plant-expression constructs in their laboratory.
You can learn more by clicking on the image on the right.
TU_Eindhoven team
The Tu-Eindhoven team are compiling a ‘Cloning Guide’ for future iGEM teams. We have contributed a chapter on Golden Gate Cloning, which we used for the assembly of parts into plant expression vectors. The guide can be found on Eindhoven’s wiki: https://2015.igem.org/Team:TU_Eindhoven/Collaborations/CloningGuide
You can learn more by clicking on the image on the right.
Manchester-Graz team
The Manchester-Graz team are also working on a project centred around the gut microbiome. We learned this because our PhD adviser, Sibyl, met their supervisor at a carbohydrate conference in May 2015.
Manchester-Graz have developed an expression system designed to regulate single and multi-gene pathways for an intestine expression. They helped us to model butyrate production in the gut. We exchanged parts to conduct reciprocal testing experiments but have so far not been successful in collecting data.
You can see the butyrate production model by clicking on the image on the right.
UK Meet Up
On the 5th of September 2015, three of our team members travelled to London to attend the UK iGEM meetup hosted by The University of Westminster. Flavia, Leda and Farhan represented the UEA-NRP team by presenting our project to members of around a dozen other UK iGEM teams, and fielding questions from them.
In addition to the team presentations, we were also lucky enough to attend talks by representatives from Desktop Genetics, Synbiota and Synthace on some of the latest developments in molecular biology, and emerging cloning technologies. Throughout the day we were also able to mingle with the other teams - a great opportunity to make friends before Boston and to trade success and horror stories from our respective labs.
Picture taken by Westminster iGEM team 2015
