WHO ARE WE

The London Biohackspace is a UK open biolab, run entirely by its volunteer members, based at the London Hackspace. We are the first community lab in the UK approved for carrying out genetic techniques and we are the only community lab taking part in iGEM from Europe. Our lab is grounded on open-source principles and community development, which allows the freedom for anyone to pursue collaborative or individual projects. The strength of the biohacking and DIYbio community is the diversity of its members. London Biohackspace hopes to encourage enthusiastic amateurs and professionals with backgrounds in a broad mix of professions such as artists, engineers, biologists and programmers to carry out innovative bioscience projects. Anybody can join us and become a Biohacker!

PROJECT OUTLINE

Our project aims to develop an all-in-one toolbox for creating designer brewing yeast strains that can be modified to produce beers with novel flavours, scents, colours, nutrients and bioluminescence. We will also hope to enhance the use of yeast as a suitable chassis for community labs involved in synthetic biology. This will be achieved by developing new genetic parts which when combined will function as a platform to allow multiple genes to be integrated into chromosomal DNA of existing brewing strains. Additional parts will be created that allow designers to regulate the level of expression of inserted proteins thus giving users the ability to create novel brewing strains. The project will also explore how effective such organisms are in producing genuinely novel drink products that can challenge what beer can be, the project will produce an example product for the future of home brewing: a variety pack / kit for home brewers to experiment with different varieties of engineered yeast in their home brewing endeavours.