Team:UNIZAR/Education






Education

Education:

Making a decision

We all have basic knowledge about history, geography, art, or literature, although science is sometimes left apart. We consider that there is basic scientific knowledge that many people do not know and should know. Thanks to the pandemic, even children know terms such as DNA, antibodies, or PCRs. However, there are still anti-vaccine groups that deny the safety and efficacy of vaccines misunderstanding how they work. Therefore, we believe that everyone should acquire a certain scientific literacy.
Sometimes, the widespread idea that science is difficult reduces people's motivation to learn, which leads to misinformation. In fact, the results of the surveys we conducted showed us that synthetic biology is little known and sometimes perceived as a negative thing. We believe that nowadays, all of us scientists have the duty to share our knowledge with the rest of the population in the most concise and simple way so that the information is accessible to everyone. In science, making new discoveries and improvements is as essential as being able to communicate them.
We decided that we wanted to take action and bring science closer to the population, in a way that also facilitated the communication of the key aspects of our project. All of us agreed that our educational activities had to be in-person, since we consider that face-to-face contact facilitates communication and open dialogue (1), especially after a pandemic that has forced us to spend too many hours looking at screens.
Therefore, after contemplating several options including online interactions such as creating podcasts or other types of audiovisual material, we decided to carry out a series of scientific outreach sessions. We wanted to make sure that the majority of people attended our events, so we distributed them in terms of dates and locations. However, as we did not want to leave behind those who could not come and also reach a larger audience, we broadcasted the development of our events through social media: Human Practices

Objectives

We carried out a series of scientific outreach sessions in the streets of some Aragonese cities, during which we also explained what iGEM is and what the project we are working on consists of.
  • Conveying the importance of the scientific method as a procedure to obtain new knowledge, based on the process of observing, asking questions, and seeking answers through experiments. In addition, with these simple experiments aimed especially at children and young people, we wanted to stimulate their interest in studying careers related to biological sciences.
  • Spread synthetic biology and the enormous number of applications it has, highlighting some of those that are used practically daily by many people, most of whom do not know how they have been developed. For example, some vaccines, insulin, drugs, tests for diagnosing diseases or for detecting contaminants...
  • Explaining what iGEM and the project we are developing consist of and how its applications could have an impact on society. In this way, the population can perceive science as something closer to them and see that there is a real application to what researchers do in the laboratory.

Scientific outreach sessions

When?
The outreach sessions took place on some weekends in August and September. We chose those dates because they coincide with periods of a great influx of people to these cities, either by tourist destination or by regional festivals.

What?
The experiments were:
DNA extraction from bananas or tomatos.
Determination of the blood group of some samples using antibodies against proteins A, B, and Rh.
Visualization in simple microscopes of sugar, an ant, an anther, and an amoeba.
Determination of the pH change in water in which lombardy had previously been cooked by adding an acid compound (water with lemon) or a basic compound (water with bicarbonate).
Where?
During these days our team traveled around the autonomous community of Aragón (Figure 1). First, we visited Huesca and Teruel, both provincial capitals. Then, we went to Calatayud and Monzón, smaller cities but where people from nearby towns often go - we wanted to make sure that our project reached everyone in our community! Last but not least, we went back to the city where it all started and where we conducted our experiments: Zaragoza.
Figure 1. Cities of Aragon that we visited (2).
How?
With the permission of the city councils of the different cities, we set up a table in the most emblematic and busy streets/squares. We gave a bracelet to the people who passed by our table in order to get their attention and to come and learn with us. To explain what the iGEM competition and our project consist of, we placed a large explanatory poster (view in the gallery) that served as visual support for our explanations. Once our audience understood the context of the competition, we carried out a series of experiments whose protocols can be downloaded here. After receiving a theoretical explanation of each experiment and the steps to follow, the attendees were in charge of carrying them out following our instructions.


Gallery

Here we show some photos from informative stands in Aragonese cities. People was so interested in this activity that even the TV and the news interviewed us.

Communication:

European Researchers' Night 2021

Figure 2. 2021 European Researchers' Night poster
The European Researchers' Night (Figure 2) is a Europe-wide public event, which displays the diversity of science and its impact on citizens' daily lives in fun and inspiring ways. This year, the event took place in 29 countries on Friday 24 September 2021. This event aims to bring research and researchers closer to the public, promote excellent research projects across Europe and beyond, increase the interest of young people in science and research careers, and showcase the impact of researchers work on people’s daily lives (3). Click on the image for more information.
We had the pleasure of being part of the European Researchers' Night at the Paraninfo of the University of Zaragoza and at the CaixaForum (a cultural center managed by the "la Caixa" Foundation) in the same city. We spent the evening explaining what our project consists of for the iGEM competition.

To explain the recombination of the gene fragments that generate antibodies, we used cards with different words that allowed us to form sentences. The cards were red, blue and green, which represented the complementarity determining regions CDR1, CDR2 and CDR3, respectively (Figures 3, 4). We asked people to read some sentences that we had previously formed with the cards, and then to try to form new sentences by exchanging the cards for others of the same color. In this way, people learned that the possibilities of combining words to obtain new sentences are very high, as is the case with gene fragments of antibodies (nanobodies), thus obtaining an enormous variability.
Figure 3 Figure 4 Figure 5
Figure 3, 4. Red, blue and green cards with distinct types of words that represented dfferent CDR1, CDR2 and CDR3 fragments, respectively
Figure 5. Plasmids with selection marker and promoter, before and after being cut with restriction enzymes for clonning

Furthermore, that day we explained how we inserted into plasmids the sequences of the nanobodies generated by recombination (Figure 5). To show one of the many applications that antibodies have, we conducted an experiment to determine the blood group, in which antibodies are used to agglutinate erythrocyte membrane proteins, resulting in a visible precipitate. Finally, the children (and adults) who came to see us had the opportunity to learn how to use the micropipettes that scientists need for their work.
It should be noted that those who came to our stand showed great interest in understanding how the generation of different antibodies occurs in living beings. Many of them told us that with the pandemic they had learned a lot about antibodies, but they had never heard of the origin of their variability, which fascinated them. Regarding our project, the fact that we could obtain antibodies in bacteria without using animals left them speechless, and they wished us success and good results in the competition.
The support we received from the assistants and their words of gratitude for our explanations made the European Researchers' Night a tremendously enriching experience for all of us.

Gallery

Here we show some photos from the European Researchers' Night.

Social Media

Throughout the year we have generated diverse content on our social networks to communicate key aspects of our project. Here you can find Twitter threads about nanobodies, E. coli and the genetic recombination process, but also funny and explanatory Tik Tok videos. Last but not least, we have done a raffle to everyone that upload a photo with our team card. This team card could be taken in one of the scientific outreach sessions. The winner got a stuffed lama!


References:

  1. Illingworth S. Delivering effective science communication: advice from a professional science communicator. Semin Cell Dev Biol. 2017;70:10–6.
  2. Aprender las ciudades de Aragón [Internet]. [cited 2021 Oct 16]. Available from: https://www.websaber.es/geografia/espana/ciudades/aragon/interactivo/ciudades_aragon.htm
  3. 2021 European Researchers’ Night | Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions [Internet]. [cited 2021 Oct 16]. Available from: https://ec.europa.eu/research/mariecurieactions/event/2021-european-researchers-night