Here, at Team BIOSINT México, we believe that science must be a common good, which is beneficial to every human being and useful for the development of the society and the accomplishment of the greater good.
And, as a common good, science should be free and accessible for all the community, and in order to achieve this state, we should take actions that are directed towards socializing the knowledge with the public.
As our actions, and those of the SynBio community, should not have as a goal the public recognition neither the economical reward, they should be considered a form of art.
We consider that the easiest way for the public to acknowledge the current development of the scientific research, specially regarding the field of Synthetic Biology, is by the participation and socialization of this topics in a way that results comprehensible and easy to recognize and understand for the general public.
Therefore, art and its capacity to transcend the time and space, and the universal meaning it has, turn out to be the best possible way to share the knowledge in a meaningful, fun and effective way.
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Why Art?
This project aims to develop an organic genetically modified machine that have the capacity to function as a biosensor. This biosensor will be useful in biotechnological and research processes. Thanks to Synthetic Biology techniques, it is possible to create a microorganism with the ability to gain luminescent stimuli in order to visually report them through chromoproteins production. Since it is a modular project, it is very likely to adapt it with the main goal to respond to other stimuli, as pollution agents and other chemicals.
Since the light receptors and the corresponding transcription factors are not part of the Escherichia coli’s genome, it is necessary to synthesize them with constitutive promoters in order to have them all the time. These receptors are specifically blue and red light receptors, and both of them phosphorylate the corresponding transcription factors in darkness or absence of the light wave the receptors sense. As the receptors sense not the light, but the absence of it, we have switched the chromoproteins with the receptors. In few words, if there is not blue light the production of red proteins starts, and if there is not red light the production of blue proteins starts as well.
We have decided to add one more color: yellow. And we added this color without a yellow light receptor, but with a system of siRNA’s in the others systems. We also are planning to synthesize this yellow protein constitutively and when other system turn on, also the siRNA’s will be transcribed and will stop the translation of yellow protein.
