Awards/Achievements
Gold Medal
Criterion Description Link
Excellence in
Synthetic Biology
Impress the judges with your work towards three Special Prizes of your choice . You must demonstrate excellence in both General Biological Engineering and in at least one Specialization. Note: Software and AI Village teams cannot select the Software Special Prize as a Gold medal criterion. By competition rules, teams in the Software and AI Village are not eligible to win the Software Special Prize.
General biological engineering:
Find our Model page.
Specializations:
Find our education page.
Best Diagnostics Project nomination:
Our project, Heartecho, stands out for its innovative integration of synthetic biology and clinical diagnostics in the critical knowledge gap of Reverse Cardio-Oncology. This new discipline investigates how cardiovascular diseases accelerate cancer progression, which is a vital but underexplored area in global health.
Innovative Diagnostic Approach:
We introduced the Loop-Initiated RNA Activator (LIRA) detection system and made it a dual-arm AND logic gate to identify key miRNAs linked to cancer progression in post-myocardial infarction patients. This system integrates with a cell-free platform to deliver visible results via chromogenic methods, ensuring simplicity, accessibility, and cost-effectiveness. By targeting miR142-3p and miR210-3p, which are aberrantly expressed after MI, our diagnostic kit enables early detection, potentially enhance cancer prevention for high-risk populations.
Comprehensive Modeling and Experimental Design:
Our modeling work serve the project by validating the structure and functionality of the LIRA system, while our experiments design focusing on the function verification of LIRA system. Our work goes beyond technical implementation, emphasizing innovation and comprehensiveness. Through this comprehensive process, we supported our project from concept validation to practical application, opening new perspectives for exploring the relationship between cardiovascular diseases and cancer.
Impactful Human Practices:
By engaging stakeholders such as healthcare professionals, patients and ethicists, we ensured our diagnostic kit aligns with societal needs and ethical considerations. This integration of diverse perspectives refined our design and enhanced its relevance to real-world.
Extensive Education Outreach:
We emphasized public engagement through innovative educational efforts, making synthetic biology accessible to diverse people. Multiple approaches had inspired people's interest in the field and the deeper understanding of its societal benefits.
Holistic Project Documentation:
Our meticulously maintained and well-structured wiki provide transparency and replicability. From the experimental design to human practice activities, every aspect of our project has been documented to inspire and guide future teams.
By creatively addressing a global health challenge, advancing iGEM community, and demonstrating a strong commitment to societal impact, our project exemplifies excellence in diagnostics and deserves the nominees of Best Diagnostic Project.
Best Model nomination:
Our modeling work goes beyond technical implementation, emphasizing innovation and comprehensiveness. Through this comprehensive modeling process, we supported our project from concept validation to practical application, opening new perspectives for exploring the relationship between cardiovascular diseases and cancer.
Our Model conducted in-depth bioinformatic analysis for miRNA identification. By integrating bioinformatic analysis, ROC diagnostics, and experimental validation , we identified reliable biomarkers for screening cancer in cardiovascular disease patients.
Our Model designed the single-arm LIRA structure capable of detecting one kind of target miRNA and documented the design process into a standardized process. Our Model performed a comprehensive analysis of the stem-loop ratio at the binding sites between the single-arm LIRA and miRNA, constructing 280 functional single-arm sequences. This laid a foundation for further optimization of miRNA detection.
Further, we designed the double-armed LIRA structure capable of simultaneously detecting two kinds of target miRNAs and meticulously documented the design process into a standardized process, resulting in the construction of 6 functional double-armed LIRA structures. This design expanded the application range of LIRA, enhancing the flexibility and accuracy of multi-miRNA detection.
Our Model carried out in-depth analysis and optimization of the designed double-armed structures, utilizing a Random Forest model combined with simulated data the value calculated according to the indicator for parameter optimization. The effectiveness of the model was validated through experimental verification.
Our Model also conducted kinetic simulations of the LIRA system observing the response times and concentration changes of the LIRA system. The analysis of concentration changes provided valuable insights into the dynamic response of the LIRA system.
Innovatively, we introduced 3D surface analysis, simulating the interaction between double-armed LIRA and varying miRNA concentrations, ensuring that the LIRA system better aligns with the complexities of clinical applications.
Best Integrated Human Practices:
IHP is integrated with the project throughout the entire process, promoting and enhancing each other. Significantly, ethics was considered all the time. For the final implementation of the project, we have embraced the full-scale commercialization. Through extensive and meaningful interaction with all stakeholders, we have successfully achieved the closed loops.
The modern spectrum of diseases and the lack of public awareness have led to societal demand for Heartecho, which we have keenly identified.
This year, we have interviewed 23 stakeholders, including experts, doctors, patients, and corporations. This comprehensive approach not only enhances our understanding of the project but also supports informed decision-making throughout its various phases.
After considering the current public understanding, as well as ethical and legal standards, Heartecho has determined the demand and established the specifications.
Through advice from multidisciplinary experts, we gradually generated, promoted, and refined our project, transitioning from ischemic heart disease to coronary heart disease, and finally determining myocardial infarction as the final choice.
With continuous patient and public feedback, Heartecho's features have been iteratively improved.
Additionally, we take responsibility for our stakeholders through interviews, sports activities, social welfare publications, and social media .
Best Education nomination:
Our education core is "Wider and Deeper", which symbolizes our commitment to engaging a broader range of communities in synthetic biology, fostering deeper communication and understanding.
To ensure inclusivity across all age groups, we've cultivated an expansive education tree, organizing activities according to the unique characteristics and needs of different age groups, which has successfully integrated 17 schools and reached out to 1,682 participants .
We noticed the difficulties faced by minority students in accessing synthetic biology and recognized that teachers, parents, and community workers are not only a new community, but also have the potential to influence and inspire more people to explore this fascinating field.
To further enhance engagement and learning, we've hosted a series of innovative events, such as "iGEMers' Day," "Design the Heart in Your Mind," "21 Days, Let's Make Heart Healthier," and "Lab Wonders & Micro Art" . These events have provided exciting platforms for participants to appreciate diverse applications in synthetic biology.
We ingeniously designed four games, including two video games, a jigsaw puzzle, and a card game named SYNO. These games have been instrumental in making synthetic biology education more accessible and enjoyable for learners of all ages.
In view of the benefits of multi-sensory learning, we innovatively commence our educational journey through sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch.
Additionally, we've crafted four unique theme handbooks, each enriching the learning experience and providing valuable resources for learners to explore and delve deeper into the subject.
We constructed an educational activity feedback form to promote mutual learning and/or a dialogue. Ultimately, we close the loop of education.
Our aspiration is that through our dedicated efforts, the knowledge of synthetic biology will inspire and empower individuals to contribute to the advancement of this cutting-edge discipline, ultimately benefiting society and driving progress in the field of synthetic biology.
Best Wiki nomination:
As a medium and window to show our project to the world, the Wiki should not only ensure the integrity and readability of the content, but also have enough aesthetics and interactivity to impress the readers.
We read the whole requirements from the official website carefully before writing the web page, and strictly follow them in the subsequent design to ensure that all our text, images, etc. are correctly cited. These are undoubtedly the basis of everything that the Wiki does.
We hope that when readers browse our website, they are not reading the content unilaterally, but communicating and interacting with us. For example, when a reader browses the Home page, the inspiration and logic of our project will gradually show with the scrolling of the mouse; When the reader selects content in the left-hand or jumps to other pages at the end of the Home page, a simple animation will help him/her to locate. At the same time, we also combine the basic needs and daily habits of the presented content to design, such as turning notebook pages into an electronic calendar, and adding mutual-support cooperation teams to the gachapon machine, which we believe will improve the reader's experience.
Our web page is a "purple" wholeness, which is a memory point that we leave to our readers. After countless adjustments and revisions, we have a good-looking logo that perfectly interprets the meaning of our project, a page background that looks like a sunset landscape, and a header image that visualizes the content when each page is first entered - a consistent "blood vessel" background to echo the theme of the project, and a consistent typography format that makes the connection between pages more compact.
We value the importance of illustrations. Good illustrations can not only make many texts seem monotonous, but also summarize or supplement the gains given by the text more intuitively. We iterate on the colors, layouts, and presentations of our illustrations to make them stand out on our pages.