Team:SDU-Denmark/Tour61
Are peptide aptamers the new black?
When making a project that significantly changes the agenda for antibody production and use, it is important to shed light on the people’s opinion. Is there at all a common demand for our idea? To get these answers we conducted a survey (questionnaire) asking people about their opinion on the use of laboratory animals in scientific research and antibody production.
The Respondents
The questionnaire was available for one month and shared via our accounts on facebook and twitter. To get answers from all over the world we send out the questionnaire to various iGEM teams asking them to help sharing it. The questionnaire brought in answers from 291 people. These people were primarily from Europe, but also people from North and South America, Asia and Australia answered. The majority of the respondents were young people in the ages of 19-29 and roughly 2/3 was either working or studying in the fields of life sciences such as biochemistry, molecular biology, bioengineering or medicine.
Results
From the data above, it is shown that most people (60 %) in general have an ambivalent perspective on the use of laboratory animals in scientific research. When asked specifically one the use of laboratory animals to produce antibodies 87 % of the respondents believe it is okay to use them. At first sight, this data indicates that people actually do not mind the use of laboratory animals when it concern production of antibodies. However, when asked to if they would prefer if antibodies were produced in an alternate organism like E. coli, 71 % of the respondents agrees that they indeed would prefer if an organism like E. coli produced antibodies.
Conclusion
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