Collaboration & Communication
1. Inviting Outstanding iGEM Teams for Learning Sessions
At the beginning of our team formation, we felt that the work of BIT-China in 2023 was still lacking. Therefore, we invited several teams that achieved excellent results to share their experiences and insights with us. For example, we invited Fudan 2023 to explain how to design outstanding software and ZJU-China 2023 to discuss how to align modeling work with experimental design. These exchanges provided us with valuable insights into the competition and helped us gain a new understanding of iGEM.
2. Beijing iGEMers Exchange Meeting
On May 19, 2024, we collaborated with the iGEM team Tsinghua-M and invited Peking, PekingHSC, and Tsinghua to discuss project ideas and initial experiments at the Tsinghua University Engineering Museum. Our project was recognized by the other four teams, acknowledging its potential contribution to environmental protection. However, there were also questions raised during the exchange. Tsinghua-M questioned whether our complex experiments could be completed before the competition. Although we couldn’t provide an immediate answer, we reminded our wet lab team to plan their experiments carefully and monitor progress.
3. Exchange with Yaxin from Heidelberg
Yaxin, the captain of Heidelberg 2023, led her team to achieve remarkable results, including Best Bioremediation and Best Sustainable Development Goals. Earlier this year, she explained the significance and methods of SDG work to us. In June, we invited her again to provide suggestions for our initial SDG work plan. She affirmed our plan and offered her ideas, suggesting that we listen to the views and needs of people living in battery-polluted areas. This would help our project reach more people and address real issues. We benefited greatly from this and decided to include this aspect in our work, interviewing people and communities in polluted areas.
4. Exchange with Tianjin University
In 2023, we closely collaborated with Tianjin, so in May this year, we visited Tianjin University to discuss our project. They shared their idea of using light-controlled synthesis of melatonin to help astronauts sleep. We found that their genetic circuit was very similar to our 2023 project, both using the yeast MVA pathway. Therefore, we provided them with guidance. They also questioned the actual leaching efficiency of the acid we used. We explained and pointed out that proper heating could improve leaching efficiency, which would be our technique to enhance it.
5. Exchange with Universities in Shanghai
Previously, our exchanges were mainly held in Beijing and Tianjin. We realized this might lead to a regional bias in the information we collected, so we decided to hold an exchange in Shanghai, one of the major cities in southern China. We collaborated with Fudan, ShanghaiTech-China, and Tongji-China to hold an exchange meeting at Fudan University. We introduced the project background and basic ideas, raised awareness about the severity of lithium battery pollution, and collected opinions on our project and environmental protection efforts. These inputs influenced our subsequent work.
6. Exchange with Queen’s University Belfast
Dr. Huang Meilan, an associate professor at the School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering at Queen’s University Belfast, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry (FRSC), and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology (FRSB), was invited to Beijing for an exchange. We explained the project background and content to her and her students. Dr. Huang highly praised our project and was surprised that we could undertake such a large project. We then encouraged free communication among students, as exchanging ideas with people from different backgrounds helps in project design by considering more factors. This opportunity also allowed us to understand the current state of the foreign battery market.
7. CCiC Exchange Conference
The China iGEMer Community Conference (CCiC) is a national conference initiated by Chinese iGEM teams, aiming to provide a platform for resource sharing, mutual learning, and exchange among iGEM teams and young synthetic biology enthusiasts in China. At CCiC, BIT-China presented the Ouroboros project, attracting many teams. After our presentation, many teams raised questions, such as how to solve hardware issues during industrialization. We decided to design our hardware devices, which can be seen in detail on our hardware page (link). At CCiC, we actively communicated with professors in the field of synthetic biology about experimental design issues, gaining a deeper understanding of the cutting-edge research in synthetic biology. We also realized the importance of improving synthetic biology projects based on actual social needs. In the later stages of Human Practice, we focused on researching industrial needs, striving to make our project design more effective and refined.
8. SUSTech-China
At CCiC, SUSTech-China showed great interest in our project and genetic circuit, and we had a private exchange. Their project focused on carbon dioxide absorption to mitigate the greenhouse effect, designing corresponding engineered bacteria. Our conversation made us realize the environmental damage caused by greenhouse gases, so we included carbon dioxide absorption in our considerations. Later, we conducted a special investigation on this, using metal-organic framework materials (MOF) to absorb carbon dioxide and reduce the project’s carbon emissions (see the sustainability page for details).
9. Hangzhou-SDG
We had a friendly exchange with the high school team Hangzhou-SDG, which has a similar research field. Our mineralization experiment used the same method as theirs, both using urease from Bacillus pasteurii to induce carbonate formation. Their application ideas opened up a new sustainable development impact for us. Since they had not yet conducted experiments at that time, we provided guidance and some experimental precautions. We were happy to help other iGEM teams, especially high school teams. High school teams are like new buds in the field of synthetic biology, and we hope they can grow (see the sustainability page for details).
10. Exchange with Peking University East China Institute
Invited by ECIB-PKU, we participated in an exchange meeting held in Suzhou, exploring the integration of synthetic biology with education, military, artificial intelligence, and other fields with SUSTech-China, Peking, and PekingHSC. The collision and intersection of different disciplines generated many novel ideas. Our team members spoke as representatives, sharing their views. We marveled at the novelty of synthetic biology and believed that these imaginative ideas might become a reality in the future.
11. Participating in the Synthetic Biology Competition and Winning an Award
This year, BIT-China participated in the Synthetic Biology Challenges (Synbio Challenges) for the first time. Synbio Challenges, organized by the Chinese Society of Biotechnology (CSBT), provides a platform that brings together over 100 synthetic biology teams from dozens of universities across China. This competition offered opportunities for collaborative discussions and knowledge sharing with some of the most outstanding synthetic biology teams nationwide. Participating in these interactions not only enriched our project but also fostered a vibrant community of innovators dedicated to pushing the boundaries of synthetic biology. In this competition, we not only won a gold medal but also ranked in the top ten overall. This recognition not only affirmed our project but also boosted our team’s morale. During the competition, we met Professor Zhang Guimin from Beijing University of Chemical Technology. Professor Zhang suggested we use a two-step leaching method, but after experimental verification, we found that due to the adsorption of ions by Aspergillus niger, this method could not obtain ions in the solution. Therefore, we decided to continue using the medium leaching method.
12. Roundtable Discussion on SDG at SC
At the end of the competition, we participated in a roundtable discussion organized by the hosts. Our team members, along with experts such as Dr. Yi Xiao from the Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, discussed the contributions of synthetic biology to the environment and agriculture. Our team members took this opportunity to ask, “How can synthetic biology contribute to promoting sustainable development?” The experts explained the potential of synthetic biology in environmental protection through practical cases, which strengthened our determination to use synthetic biology to promote sustainable development.
13. World Battery and Energy Storage Industry Expo
In August this year, we participated in the World Battery and Energy Storage Industry Expo held in Guangzhou. This expo brought together many well-known companies in the battery field, including BYD and Weilan New Energy. We had pleasant exchanges with the technical and market personnel of these battery companies, listening to their suggestions and opinions on our project, which deepened our understanding of the current global battery industry.
Fig. 1 Attend World Battery and Energy Storage Industry Expo
At this expo, we learned about the entire process of lithium battery manufacturing and recycling, as well as the advanced technologies in each part. We consulted with 10 companies about the actual needs of the industry chain and understood the actual situation of lithium battery recycling companies, which deepened our understanding of the current state of the lithium battery market. Based on the actual needs we learned, we adjusted and improved our experimental design and hardware construction. At the same time, we also educated these companies about battery pollution and sustainable development, suggesting they adopt sustainable practices and include sustainability information in their reporting cycles to contribute to global sustainable business efforts.
14. Exchange with GEC-Beijing High School Team
On July 21, 2024, we had an educational exchange with the GEC-China high school team from Beijing. We introduced each other’s team projects and provided some suggestions and guidance based on the project presentations. Under the guidance of team advisors, we had more in-depth discussions on the suggestions provided. Additionally, we wanted to provide them with some information about the iGEM competition, explaining the requirements for medals and the importance of each award, as well as the iGEM timeline and reasonable work planning.
15. Exchange with Fudan and CUG-China
During previous exchanges, we found that our project had similar application directions with Fudan and CUG-China, so we sought opportunities to discuss. We shared this year’s projects with each other and studied some technical issues. At the same time, we discovered the impact of the Ouroboros project on SDG6 during this exchange. We became familiar with the application potential of leaching technology in the mining industry, which broadened our horizons and led us to focus on fields beyond lithium batteries. Later, we also conducted related research activities.
16. iG20 SDG Meetup
To better evaluate and improve our SDG work, we were invited to participate in the iG20 meeting. At this meeting, BIT-China, CAU-China, BNUZH-China, and other teams shared their SDG work and expressed their vision for promoting sustainable development. We learned a lot and also summarized the activities we had carried out.
17. Business Cooperation with InnoChem Beijing
InnoChem Technology Co., Ltd., established in 2010 and located in Beijing, is an enterprise mainly engaged in technology promotion and application services. Last year, we established a good relationship through cooperation. This year, we sought their advice again. After listening to our presentation, they expressed affirmation and praise for our project and were willing to provide us with some assistance. They also shared many industrialization techniques. For example, we can appropriately emphasize the advanced, superior, low-carbon, environmentally friendly, and innovative features of our biosynthesis technology in our publicity. Additionally, after achieving industrialization, equipment maintenance could become a way for us to gain profits. These business insights, which we could not obtain from books and academia, are very helpful for the future implementation and industrialization of our project.
