At that time there was an organized group from Universidad de Chile called OpenBio . That team was founded on December 2013 by Luis Rodriguez and Pablo Troncoso (we miss you!). Organization’s main objectives are:
1.- Boosting Synthetic Biology in Chile.
2.- Development of low cost Biotechnologies machines.
3.- Periodically attendance to the iGEM Competition.
The group used to participate in different activities in university to spread synthetic biology through workshops and informative talks.
Thanks to the activities that the group developed and others that were attended by them, was possible to contact with people interested in being part of the project and very committed to the tasks involved in developing it.
Finally we formed the Team iGEM Uchile-OpenBio, we all feel part of the team and if you want to know more about the members of the team we invite you to see our 
The group inscription fee was paid by CeBiB and DIQBT for a total amount of
4000 USD. CeBiB also lent us their laboratories to developthe project and help us with diffusion.
Centre for Biotechnology and Bioengineering (CeBiB) is a center of excellence in frontier research by an interdisciplinary team composed of renowned national and international, able to investigate key issues of modern biotechnology and bioengineering, including important applications in industry.
Department of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology (DIQBT) is part of Faculty of phisics sciences and mathematics (FCFM), Univerisdad de Chile. It teaches two engineering specialities: Chemical and Biotechnological Engineering.
¿How did we obtain this support at the first time?
Ignacio Ardiles and Luis Rodriguez created a Sponsorship letter offering to the institutions being our sponsors. In exchange for their support we offer them:
1.- Team official clothing.
2.- Our official Website and social networks.
3.- 10 cm downside the official poster.
4.- Our Wiki project, actually this part.
Also we will honor our sponsors at the end of our presentation with special mentions. 
After the registration the team set up weekly meetings to plan the work of each week. Also each member of the team adopted a project area. The distribution of areas was agreed by all members.
We agreed that the responsible of each area would coordinate all the activities of that specific area. However, all team members are responsible for asisting in the areas applying for aid.
Each area has to report their advance and show their main activities for next weeks. With this assigment we are training our leadership and planning skills on each member.
Project areas and responsibles
We received an invitation for a contest conducted by Aplica tu Idea and Fundacion COPEC UC where you can give a short pitch on 3 minutes to present your idea. The first place wins $ 200 to support the project. Despite the price was less than 1% of our budget it was a great oportunity to show our project and get prepaired to next presentations.
Gustavo Calvo was in charge of creating the speech and make the presentation at the headquarters of the Universidad Católica. He obtained the Second place on the contest and was awarded with a special price for the team. Although we did not get 200 dollars, the contest opened our way to make the project better known.
Integrated DNA Technologies sells short strands of DNA called oligonucleotides. IDT manufactures the oligo using chemical DNA synthesis machines designed and built by them. IDT is the largest manufacturer of custom oligo products in the US today.
IDT launched a promotion applicable for all participating iGEM teams 2015. They will provde equivalent to 20kb gBlocks Gene Fragments from 1th april to 24 september. The avaluation of the support was around 4272 USD (Golden Sponsor). Of course we cannot miss this chance and asked for our benefits.
Jose Duguet contacted IDT at first with the list of g-blocks needed. They told us that they have a local distributor: Fermelo BIOTEC. Alejandro Sanchez, technical supporter of Fermelo BIOTEC contacted us and brought us the support , intermediating the arrival of oligonuclotides to our laboratory. We are very glad with their arrival.
OpenBeauchef consists of a co-working space (collaborative work) that FCFM facilities. It is located at 851 Avenue Beauchef in the OpenLab. It is designed to create a meeting place for cooperative activities that allow interaction between various innovation actors. It includes students, researchers and developers from every faculty of the Universidad de Chile, together with participants from academia, business, public sector, graduates and investors.
The contact was made first by Severine Cazaux , who tried to contact our Dean Faculty. At first he conducted us to the OpenLab to obtain some team support. They helped us with Mentoring through 2 workshops where we could see our team interests and availability for the project. They also gave us some tasks to gain support on the project: We had to collect 4 interests letters related to our project.
After that and other meetings they wrote a report of the team with the results of the activities. Finally they gave us tips for our team work.
It realy helped us to align all members interests. Also it was our first approachment to our Faculty.
ICEI Ingeniería y construcción LTDA was funded in 1995 in Chile, as an association of professionals with proven experience in the development of industrial, mining and real estate throughout the country projects.
ICEI Ingeniería y construcción LTDA. supported us with 1695 USD (Silver Sponsor). The money was used to pay 1 plane tickets and 1 individual registration fee. They also supported us with the purchase process of 7 plane tickets by lending us money until we get the money of the Crowdfunding Campaign.
This company was contacted directly by Anariky Negrete.
Finally they lend us more money, to purchase the lasts 2 plane tickets. This was a gesture of great confidence with us because we were waiting for the confirmation of next sponsor. We really appreciate what the have done for us!.
Our Budget was made for 9 members of the team and then was agregated the team instructor.
This budget was made by Ignacio Ardiles, with collaboration of David Sepulveda . It definitely helped us to convince sponsors to finance the remaining costs of the team. This budget gave them clarity on the use that will be given to the funds that they will provide.
This budget was made by Ignacio Ardiles, with collaboration of David Sepulveda . It definitely helped us to convince sponsors to finance the remaining costs of the team. This budget gave them clarity on the use that will be given to the funds that they will provide.
To date, according to the records we have assembled about 95% of the budget. We have funded IGEM Event, Accommodation and partialy Others items.What others item of the budget exceeded the estimated cost, as the cost of clothing and networking far exceeded our expectations. This has finally conditioned us to readjust the cost of food and transport at a much lower amount than initially estimated. We can not define the readjustment yet because we are awaiting final quote from the official clothing. Get more details of the budget attached on link.
Faculty of Physics Sciences and Mathematics (FCFM) of the Universidad de Chile has more than 170 years of existence. It focuses on higher education and the development of basic sciences, engineering sciences and technological applications.
FCFM supported the team with 4218 USD (Golden Sponsor). The money provided is going to be used to pay the accommodation expenses remaining for 9 members of the team!.
The contact was with Felipe Alvarez, (Vice-Decan of FCFM) and it was made by Severine Cazaux since last May!. FCFM agreed to have a meeting on August. Luis Rodriguez, Severine Cazaux and Ignacio Ardiles attended with a sponsor presentation, to show the current status of the project and the real potential for them: New Technology research lines around Synthetic biology.
To see the sponsors presentation click at the following link.
Faculty of Phisics Sciences and Mathematics published a journalistic article on its official website after their agree to be sponsors of our team. It was done by Noemi Miranda (Communications officer at CeBiB) and Ana Maria Saez (Communications coordinator at FCFM).
The project was highlighted on the official website of the Ministry of Environment and their social networks. The ministry got interested in the project because of its sustainable character. They considered it was an environmental friendly project. The contact Noemi Miranda.
The insight arose from the FABLAB UChile, after Pablo Troncoso met Fernando Torres (project engineer in FABLAB). They told us how important was the PLA in the 3D impression. We also share interest in the open source philosophy so they gave us all the support for our project including an letter of interest.
After that our team looked for different uses of PLA in the society concluding that it was a powerful project and José Duguet provided us the scientific literature. The conception of the idea was born and the main goal of the project is to reduce the cost of synthesis of polylactic acid to encourage a massive use of this new material. We hope to stop pollution by plastic made from fossil fuels
Research, Science and Technology National Commission (CONICYT) provided us around $2570 USD (Silver Sponsor). We used the money to pay 4 event fee payments.
CONICYT was founded in 1967 as an advisory entity to the Presidency in matters of scientific development. Their strategic pillars are: the promotion of human capital formation and strengthening scientific and technological base of the country.
The contacts were made by Severine Cazaux since last may through emails to Leticia Toro, representative of CONICYT. Our first letter sent asked for 8 inscriptions fee for the iGEM Competition.
At first we did not have answers. Then Severine Cazaux and David Sepulveda visited CONICYT offices requesting a response. That act was well received by the institution and finally on 18 June we got the PCI CONICYT letter, giving notice of the funds allocated for 4 people.
“Silence is the element in which all great things are formed”
Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881)
We decided to launch a crowdfunding campaign where we could explain our project and get funds to travel to Boston, USA. The goal was to collect 2,600,000 CLP (3715 USD) for the next 45 days.
The platform selected was Fondeadora, a Mexican platform which has expanded its business to Chile. It has a All or nothing model.
The campaign was designed by Gustavo Calvo and Ignacio Ardiles, edited by Natalia Urtubia and the music of the video was provided by Nicolas Cazaux, Severine's Brother.
The choice of platform was made for three main reasons.
1. One of the creators of the platform came from Mexico in 2014 to present our university and we considered that it was a great and effective platform.
2. The platform has good payment methods, such as Web-pay or transfers that are well accepted by the people of our country.
3. The platform has offices in Chile which facilitates our direct communication.
The Campaign started on 16 of June on 2015. After that we strive to spread the campaign on our networks with different messages, banners and other kind of posts.
Sigma Aldrich is a leading Life Science and High Technology company focused on enhancing human health and safety, manufactures and distributes more than 250,000 chemicals, biochemicals and other essential products to more than 1.4 million customers globally in research and applied labs as well as in industrial and commercial markets.
Sigma-Aldrich provided us laboratory reagents valuated around 1900 USD (Golden Sponsor). The contacts were made by Luis Rodriguez. He contacted Cristian Torres (Company’s Sales Manager) by email, asking him for support in first time (and attaching our sponsorship letter).
They told us that they usually don't give funds for those instances but maybe they could support us with laboratory reactives. So after that we defined which was the list of reactives we could ask for this institution. We sent the list on may 26 and last June the reactives arrived to our laboratory. Thanks to Sigma aldrich we could start our lab experiments.
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Crowdfunding campaign ended succesfully on July 29th reaching a total amount of 2,620,003 CLP (101% of the goal). The support was provided by 83 differents funders (we included the list of people how gave money in cash).
Our commitment to our funders is to provide them information about the project and then rewards as soon as we get them (It will be after the competition)
Finally about the money withdraw from Fondeadora, we consider that it was a tedious process. That is because they told us we could withdraw the money 5 days after reaching the goal. But the days passed and the money did not arrive until 31 August where we finally got our 3378 USD (The fee was around 12,3% of total).
Finally, they told us the origin of the problem (Bank issues). Despite this, we still consider Fondeadora is a good platform for funding your projects, but you may talk about the money arrival time.
gBlocks were provided by Integrated DNA Technologies . The arrival meant to us that we could finally began to assemble our genetic circuits.
But... Why are gBlocs so important?
For every design in synthetic biology, a high fidelity technique is imperative to obtain large fragments of DNA for coding our gene of interest with the regulation elements. The team initially considered to obtain the genetic source from microorgansisms, amplify them and then produce the assemblies by overlap extension by PCR. Thanks to gBlocks we could save all this work in laboratory that would require weeks, shipping times of biological material and we would not have been able perform codon optimization
Diario Atacama is a daily newspaper of the Atacama Region, Chile. The contact done was with Catalina Canales (Journalist at Diario Atacama) and it was done by Ignacio Ardiles. Also it was possible thanks to the project description done by David Sepulveda. The project description is attached at the following link.
Mariano School is a local school where did our Human Practice workshop. The activities where commanded by Severine Cazux. For this occasion she was accompanied by Luis Rodriguez and Hector Ampuero.
CeBiB supported us again with 7309 USD (they became our Platinum Partner). The money was used to pay the reservation on the 40 Berkeley Hostal, 2 plane tickets, 3 individual inscription fee, merchandising, the Official Clothing and other travel expenses.
The colaboration of CeBiB was announced after Luis Rodriguez and Ignacio Ardiles had a meeting with our instructors Dr Juan Asenjo and Alvaro Olivera. We presented our Team planning brochure with main activities and objectives of our visit tour at Boston USA. We also presented the team Budget and the letters of interest collected for OpenBeauchef. Brochure is attached at the following link
CeBiB published a journalistic article on its official website after their huge resources support. It was done by Noemi Miranda (Communications Officer at CeBiB).
La Maissonnette School is a local school where the group did another Human Practice workshop. The activities where commanded by Severine Cazux. For this occasion we attended on 2 different times to the school. At first Javiera Gomez and Gustavo Calvo accompanied Severine. For the second time Hector Ampuero and Javiera Gomez accompanied her.
El Mercurio is one of the most recognized newspapper in Chile with large national outreach. The contact was done by Noemi Miranda (Communications officer at CeBiB) and Ana Maria Saez (Communications coordinator at FCFM).
Thank You all for your support! We really appreciate what have you done for us!
Also we want to thanks to: Carlos Gómez - María Isabel Guerra - Irene Román - Nicolás Salas - Rodrigo Valenzuela - Amelia Cox Fermandois - Tatiana Jimenez - Pablo Alvarez - Rosario Rosales - Lucas Sepúlveda - Humberto Palza - Hector Concha - Nancy Carrasco - Paz Zañartu - Ana María Saez - Pablo Troncoso - Ericka Jorquera - Heinz Gerdin