Team:NTU-Singapore/Partnership

Partnership with ASIJ Tokyo

First Meeting

After watching ASIJ_Tokyo's promotion video, we reached out to them, hoping to collaborate. We had our first meeting on 22 August 2021, where we first shared more about our projects before chatting with the team.

Discussion and Sharing

As ASIJ_Tokyo was a high school team, their team shared the restrictions they faced, from the limited equipment present in their laboratory to the types of materials and parts they could handle. They were going to work on an aptamer biomarker assay. They had some questions regarding their protocol, which we gladly helped to answer.

Mentoring

Over the next few months after the first meeting, we mentored ASIJ_Tokyo, answering their protocols' questions and troubleshooting some problems they faced. After meeting with us virtually and looking at their equipment and having a better idea of what equipment the team had access to, we suggested an ELISA/ ELONA assay.

Conclusion

Eventually, ASIJ_Tokyo took up our suggestion and did an ELISA assay to verify the activity between their biomarker and their aptamers. We helped craft a protocol for them and compared it with the protocol they came up with. They clarified any doubts they had with us, and we also guided them on the materials they would require and need to order.

Assistance

ASIJ_Tokyo were also very helpful to help us in interviewing people from our target groups to help with our human practices aspect of the project. In return, we reached out to a few breast surgeons and interviewed a breast surgeon for them. We also exchanged surveys and sent them out to our contacts.



Reflection
From this partnership with ASIJ-Tokyo, we learnt more about their project that involves breast cancer and gained valuable insights to how aptamers work. We also experienced how to mentor a high school team and learnt about the challenges that they faced. With the help of ASIJ-Tokyo, we managed to secure some interviews and spread our survey to a different community so that we can learn about how they perceived and dealt with the SARS-Cov-2 pandemic. Working with ASIJ-Tokyo was a pleasurable experience. Our team had a fantastic time working with them and seeing their hard word and effort pay off.

Thank You, ASIJ Tokyo!

Partnership with ASIJ

Partnership with National University of Singapore
Introduction
One of our main project objectives is to increase awareness about synthetic biology in our community. In Singapore’s education system, there is no accessible knowledge regarding synthetic biology as it is a niche topic. After secondary school education, the only way to pursue synthetic biology is to attend a university-level biotechnology course or similar courses in polytechnics. However, the majority of the students who enter junior colleges are never exposed to synthetic biology. Students who wish to pursue synthetic biology find it difficult to find which courses to choose and there is a lack of awareness about this niche subject.
Outreach with NUS
After meeting the NUS iGEM team on the 12 July 2021, we decided to collaborate and work on an online workshop. The aim of this online workshop was to create awareness and generate interest towards synthetic biology. The workshop was offered to students in National Junior College (NJC), National University Singapore High School and a few participating secondary schools. The workshop was conducted on 4 September 2021 after 1 month of planning.
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Reflection
Through our collaboration, we learned the importance of having good communication, as there were many parties involved. Keeping each other up-to-date on what each party was responsible for was the key to the success of our partnership. From this partnership, we feel that our objectives for increasing awareness and generating interests were met as the event and videos were well-received. This could be a catalyst to enhance the educational material for synthetic biology for our community.