Timeline
This is the timeline of all events that our team participated in 2024, excluding iGEM meetups. The purple circles represent events for community engagement and the blue circles represent events for visibility outreach. To view the descriptions of the events, simply scroll over the page.
For more information on the workshop of Sint-Lodewijk school and the International Microorganism Day, click here to go to the Inclusivity page.
Community Engagement
STEM Workshop
On the 24th of February, the faculty of Engineering Technology organized a free STEM event for kids aged 12 to 15 years old, where we participated to make science more understandable and inspire the new generation of scientists. During our one-hour-long workshop, we introduced the concepts of DNA in synthetic biology and guided the kids through an experiment.
To make it more engaging, we brought a 3D-printed DNA polymerase to demonstrate a protein’s structure and a 3D-printed DNA double helix to explain DNA complementation. Also, we included a quiz filled with fun facts based on the material to give students an opportunity to practice what they learned and inspire them about science before they embarked on their DNA extraction experiment.
FTI Fair
The First edition of the Flanders Technovation and Innovation (FTI) festival (15th to 24th of March) included several events throughout Flanders to highlight innovation and technology.
One of these events was the FTI Open Technology and Innovation Day at KU Leuven University, campus Group T, which displayed several research groups. This event was free, so anyone could benefit from the exhibitions.
At our exhibition, we provided a plasmid puzzle, a 3D-DNA polymerase and a DNA structure to make synthetic biology interactive and accessible. The kids showed great interest in assembling the 3D DNA polymerase, and some visitors asked several questions and engaged in a deeper discussion.
Family Day
On this day, we participated in the Open Family Day of the KU Leuven, campus De Nayer, where families and future students had the opportunity to learn more about the university and the projects it has to offer.
We had the opportunity to have one booth at this event to explain the iGEM competition and engage future students in synthetic biology, by explaining our project. Also, we had a 3D model of a DNA double helix structure, a DNA polymerase, and a plasmid structure to describe their importance in the field and their applications.
Workshop: Science Fun for All Ages
We participated in the Hal5 Spring Fest to do our workshop: Science Fun for All ages. Our goal was to bring science to the public, and make science accessible, even to younger children. We exemplified microbes by creating a replica and explained the importance and applications of bacteria in our lives. Additionally, the workshop was free, such that it would be available to anyone independently of their socioeconomic background. For more information on the workshop click here.
The workshop utilized crafts and a cooking analogy, to embrace the work of Hal5 organizations. Hal5 include a solidary market with accessible prices for people with socio-economic difficulties. For this analogy, we compared DNA to a recipe book, the DNA strands to the cooks, a recipe card to mRNA, the kitchen to ribosomes, the ingredients to amino acids and the final dish to proteins. Also, we brought a portable microscope with which people could look at a range of cells and tissues. For more information, click here to go to the inclusivity page. For more information, click here to go to the Inclusivity page.
Workshop at Sint-Lodewijk School
As part of our efforts to make science accessible, we conducted a workshop at the Special Education School, Sint-Lodewijk. During this workshop, students learned about the importance of microbial diversity, and about the concepts of DNA, transcription and translation through an interactive activity. You can find more details about the workshop on our inclusivity page.
International Microorganism Day
We participated at the International Microorganism Day Event held and at the Museum on Natural Sciences in Brussels. The event was organized by the Young Belgian Society for Microbiology, and involved a series of interactive booths centered around microbiology themes. We hosted one of these booths, and designed two games participants could play: a pipetting race and a pin-the-flagellum-on-the-E.Coli game. You can find details of these workshops here .
Visibility Outreach
Another type of event is visibility outreach, in which we aimed to draw attention to our work and synthetic biology, through fairs and pitches, networking, exchanging ideas and promoting our project
Entrepreneurs' Day
Entrepreneur’s Day is an annual event held at the Faculty of Industrial Engineering of KU Leuven. Several companies and students attend the job fair each year. In 2024, 174 companies attended the event.
This event was the first of the year that our team participated in. During the event, we introduced the team and the competition to several people to recruit new members and earn more visibility within the community. This allowed us to expand our network, look for sponsors, and improve our communication skills.
Verderstudeerbeeurs
The Verderstudeerbeeurs was an event organized by KU Leuven to promote the study options available at the university, such as master programs, postgraduate offers and student teams.
Our team had a booth alongside the Aether and Core student teams from KU Leuven. We explained the iGEM competition, our project and our experience of participating in such teams with the interested students.
FTI Pitch
The Flanders Technology and Innovation: Young Generations conference (Pitch your ideal) was a conference that included the presence of several speakers who shared their ideas through a 3-minute pitch.
For our pitch, we chose the theme of "the power of synthetic biology, harnessing microorganisms as powerful allies". Within this topic, we explained the concept of synthetic biology, its applications and its importance to the future. Also, we discussed the iGEM competition, biomining, which is the focus of our project, and its applications, from water treatment and pharmaceuticals to space exploration. This event was crucial as it increased our visibility and taught the audience about synthetic biology.
KICK Challenges
The KICK Challenge is a business plan competition promoted by KICK, which consists of the development of an innovative idea, focusing on societal challenges and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) [1]
Our team participated in this challenge with our project idea. During this challenge, we had to develop a business plan, including the cash flow prediction and target market. We passed the first phase, which allowed us to receive feedback from coaches and participate in workshops about business developments. Although we did not advance to the finals, we had the opportunity to develop our project further.
KICK Finals
The KICK Finals gathered the final competitors of the KICK challenge, pitches from interdisciplinary teams and the KICK fair.
During this event, at Universiteitshal in Leuven, we had the opportunity to participate in the KICK fair by sharing our project with the public and also networking with other teams and professionals.
References
[1] KU Leuven. (2024, September). Kick Challenge. KU Leuven KICK.