Difference between revisions of "Team:NDNF China/Human Practices"

Overview

Biosafety, as one of the major themes of our project, was also what we strived to integrate into our human practice activities. Taking in viewpoints from both professionals and the public helped us to realize that the path of taking synbio applications beyond the laboratory requires a combinative approach: "scientific innovations" along with coordinated efforts across society.

Throughout the course of the project, we kept the impacts and contributions that Hidro could bring to society in mind and tried to use this mindset in making appraisals and further improvements.

In order to meet the needs of the public and address their concerns, we surveyed the general public on their opinions regarding synthetic biology via the internet. Information on their previous knowledge on synthetic biology was gathered so that we could improve the design of our education program. We also discovered that there was a lack of knowledge on biosafety-related legal regulations amongst non-professional communities, as well as the need for cooperative actions of government agencies and synthetic biology companies. This further led us to reach out to several professionals from both the legal sector and biological corporations.

In other words, though our project consisted of many parts, all were finalized and adapted into forms of feedback: interviews, surveys, and conversations with the general public, legal professionals, as well as pioneers in the industry.

Research and Design

We designed a number of human practice events to generate feedback on our project and encouraged suggestions on how improvements could be made.

Questionnaires

Through questionnaires, we realized that the public lacked an understanding of biosafety laws, and showed mistrust in synthetic biology products.

Goal

The goal of the project (and this survey) is to assist synthetic biology in transcending laboratory restrictions and make important contributions to its practical applications. First, we analyzed the limitations of synthetic biology in daily life through questionnaires and public surveys.

Our survey included 15 multiple choice questions, which were designed to measure the public's knowledge on synthetic biology and their opinion concerning bio-products in general and our products in specific.

Conclusion

1. The general public has limited knowledge on biosafety, but many——over 97%——are willing to increase their knowledge of biosafety through social media.

2. Besides, the general public have a relatively low proportion of awaring the law relavent to biosafty, which conducted by the government.

The results inspired us to take the social aspect of taking synbio beyond labs into consideration. In order for our goal to be achieved, exerting effort on engagement with the public was just as crucial as covering experimental aspects. We formed initial plans of encouraging the learning of synbio as well as increasing awareness of biosafety-related laws amongst the public through education. We hoped that through our actions, non-scientific communities could also have an increased understanding of synbio products and biosafety which could possibly pave the way for engineered organisms saying hi to the world.

Communicate with experts

Besides, we also spent time learning about the history, prospective applications and key challenges of synthetic biology through interviews with experts in the field.

Fankang Meng: PhD in Synthetic Biology at Imperial College London, United Kingdom

Our tutor Fankang Meng provided us with valuable knowledge based on his own first-hand experiences making bio-products. After a 30 minute long conversation, we gained a considerable amount of knowledge on synthetic biology on the field. We learned that concerns related with contamination and possible escape are major setbacks to the application of synthetic biology, providing us with a potential focus in later development of our program.

Other synthetic biology scholars, synthetic biology industry

Left: Dr. Haoqian Zhang; right: Xiaoyu Chen

After communicating with Professor Meng, we also consulted many scholars in the field of synthetic biology and related people in the industry. Among them are Dr. Haoqian Zhang (founder and CEO of Bluepha Bio), Shan Jiang (founder of Ailurus Bio), Xiaoyu Wang (founder of SynbioUK, a postdoctoral fellow at MIT) and Zongying Yang (biotech investor). According to them, there are three main problems facing the successful development of synthetic biology products to move out of the laboratory and into the real world:

1. Regulatory or safety risks caused by biosafety

2. Synthetic biology products have difficulty adapting to the constantly fluctuating environment of natural conditions

3. Ineffective track or control of the dynamic process of synthetic biology products in the outer environment

Through the survey and interviews with biologists, we identified the central themes of our project and the essential problems that needed to be solved.

Project Design

Contacting original authors

Exchanging emails with authors who develop technologies related to our program: During project design and experiment, we encountered many problems. We solved these problems through emails, etc., and received effective suggestions and feedback.

Dr. Tang provided us with a lot of experimental details and original experimental methods, as well as giving us many opinions and suggestions on optimizing the preparation of Hidro. Moreover, he affirmed our method of mass preparation of Hirdo by using molds. He believed that: Using this could not only shorten the time but also increase the efficiency in preparing more complete Hidros at one time, as well as effectively avoiding leakage caused by uneven shell and experimental operation.

Dr.Tzu-Chieh Tang

Department of Mechanical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA

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Screenshot of email communication with Dr. Tang

Public Activities

Legal proposal

Background

Our project is closely related to biosafety. We aim to prevent the escape of microorganisms and improve utilisation of the current tracing system through our product, and thus provide a safer platform for engineered strains. Meanwhile, the attention of all sectors of society on biosafety is gradually increasing. This inspired us to produce our biosafety law proposal. This action not only conformed to the international trends but also allowed us to contribute our own strength to biosafety as new generation high school students.

Through reviewing related data and closely studying the Tianjin Biosecurity Guideline for Codes of Conduct for Scientists recently developed by Tianjin University, we have come to the realization that it is necessary to help the public regain trust and hope in biotech driven applications by providing sources to relevant knowledge while also enhancing current biosafety regulations.

What we do

Based on the above considerations, we have proposed the following suggestions aiming to further perfect some aspects of the current biosafety legislation (of China). Despite being high school students, we still hope we can be involved in aiding current regulations to keep pace with frontlines of biotechnological development.

Through the process of polishing our proposal, we interviewed a few experts in biosafety field, who offered us precious advice, which played a significant role in guiding our optimizing of the proposal.

Plus, we are also planning to submit our proposals as youth representatives to offer reasonable suggestions for national policies and promote the improvement of national biosafety governance in the future.

The experts we interviewed

Mr.Bao Hanyu

Governance of Synthetic Biology. Global Envrionment Governance. Science, Technology and Innovation Policy.

Mr.Liang Yang

College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Xiamen University, B.E. in Biological Engineering.

Intellectual Property Research Institute, Xiamen University, J.M. in Intellectual Property Law Research Directions

Intellectual Property Law, Biosecurity Law, Policies on Synthetic Biology.

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Public engagement

CCiC

On Oct.27, our team participated in the CCIC for IGEM teams in China. During the event, we shared our project and experiences in human practice with other teams. Moreover, we are able to communicate with professionals working in related sectors and gain their help in future programs.

Presentations at school

As shown in our survey, the general public lacks knowledge on synthetic biology. As a key future consumer and producer in synthetic biology, students, especially high school students, are obligated to learn more about bio-safety. Thus we planned several off-line programs at local high schools. The program contains two lectures and one orientation. These programs mainly focus on the current status of synthetic biology, codes including the crucial Tianjin guidelines, and they also introduced our peers to Hidro. After our lecture, a vast majority of students felt that they have gained a considerable amount knowledge on biosafety, and many believed that they will be willing to use these bio-products due to their feasibility.

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Stakeholder Feedback

After completing the design of Hidro, we organized the relevant information and experimental data into a file, and sent it to synthetic biologists and biotech entrepreneurs for suggestions about the three main characteristics of Hidro (biosafety, stability and traceability). They showed a lot of interest in the three features of Hidro, and believed that Hidro has promoted the process of practical application of synthetic biology products to some extent (out the total rating of 10, the median was 7).

What is most exciting for us is that 91.7% of all interviewees indicated that if their future design includes the potential application of Hidro, such as various tests and in vivo drugs, they are willing to include Hidro system in product design.

In addition, we also received a lot of questions and comments. Some people asked whether Hidro has a relatively complete product form. Here, we completed a preliminary product model of food detection system in cooperation with GCGS team (see more information please visit the Partnership page). Some scholars are curious about whether Hidro shell thickness affects the sensitivity of Biosensor, which we have been thinking about. Limited by the time, we had not performed related experiments, but in later times we will research into this field, and find the most suitable thickness of the shell, ensuring Hidro's function without influencing its sensitivity.