Achievements

The main objective of the team was to create a self-sustaining mosquito trap using e.coli, and the team was successful in achieving it. The test results of our product showed that _________. As the present finished product is just a prototype, future plans for the project would include finding a more effective way to construct an ergonomic method of putting the trap together so laypeople can put the trap together without much difficulty. Some considerations for replicating the experiments are increasing the strength of the attractants (lactic acid, tryptophan and indole) and trying to attract only mosquitoes and not other species of insects, which could have unknown consequences for the ecosystem. As for the medal fulfillments, the team met the requirements for the silver medal. In addition to the requirements for the bronze medal – registering for iGEM and attending the Giant Jamboree, completing the judging form, creating a team Wiki, presenting a poster and a talk at the iGEM Jamboree, creating a page on the team Wikipage with a clear attribution of each aspect of the project, and documenting at least one BioBrick part of the project and submitting it to the Registry – the team met the additional 3 requirements for a silver medal. The new Biobrick part that the team submitted to the Registry is ________. We experimentally validated the mosquito trap device by __(leaving it out in an environment with mosquitoes?)______________. The efficiency of the Chitinase was separately tested for by _________. We used a lactic acid assay kit to test the efficiency of the lactic acid. The other part that was submitted to the Registry was ____________. Lastly, the team focused on the investigation into the consequences of disease-carrying mosquitoes and the alleviation of it beyond the scope of simply creating the mosquito trap. We identified mosquitoes as being the most deadly animal on Earth only coming behind humans through research. Seeing that a lot of the infections happen through mosquitoes, especially in countries without the resources to properly exterminate them, the team aimed to make a cost-efficient and self-sustaining solution to the problem. As this was the inaugural year of participation for NYUAD there were some logistical difficulties, but the team managed to pull through with specialists in different fields including mathematics, biology, chemistry and engineering. We were able to pool together our talents to put together a somewhat gruesomely innovative and effective bacterial solution to a problem we noticed, and had fun with it. Given these conditions the team aimed for a silver medal and thinks it is deserved.

1st part – tnaa + tnab transcription cassette (will not validate)

2nd aprt – lldd transcription cassette (validate using lactic acid assay)