Brown:March142006

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Revision as of 00:37, 22 March 2006

Meeting Minutes for March 14, 2006

Assignment of roles

Community Maker - Nick, Megan

Notetaker/Organizer (Secretary) - Angela

Journal Club Coordinator - Elena

Fundraising/PR

• Julie: Fundraising, Sheldon

• Brendan: PR

• Elaine: helping both

Faculty Liaison - Victoria

Wiki Development - Peter

Research - Annie, Sheldon

"Benevolent Dictator" =) - John

Commercialization Potential (patents, etc)

Industry Laison

We have lab space in JWW!!!

Meeting Minutes for March 21, 2006

Present: John, Kara, Angela, Annie, Jessie, Peter, Brendan, Katherine, Victoria, Meghan

Journal Club Presentation

Construction of a Genetic Toggle Switch in E. Coli

by Victoria and Meghan

• purpose: to integrate theory and experiment by constructing and testing a synthetic, bistable gene circuit (Toggle switch) based on the predictions of a simple mathematical model
• integrate (mathetic) theory and (biology) experiment
• mathematical models supposed to predict how much transcribed, testing expected outcomes
• took a switch that self-regulates and has inducer (heat, chemical) that starts
• prediction was wrong due to gene variability
• simplest, as few reagents as possible better
• specialized promoters
• ribozyme binding sites, harnessed in plasmid; ensure that they are turned into proteins individually
• genetic engineering (memory device) insert into something that you would want to be turned on for a long time
• registry of biological parts at MIT; biological switch, wire linked together (electronic diagramà biological diagram

2005 iGEM project summaries:

UCSF: Kara; genetic circuit of bacteria to respond to temperature gradient, analog vs. digital

Toronto: Angela; Cell See-Us Thermometer and Bacterial Etch-a-Sketch; used mRFP and GFP didn’t have a result

Berkeley: John; cell-cell communicator, send out genomes to other bacteria via a specific pore (channel) and the other bacteria would send something back when it received that message

Harvard: Peter; bio-sketch; use UV pen to write on bacteria, use GFP mutation as reporter; not so much a toggle switch as a one way switch; used heat to “erase”; didn’t work

Caltech: Annie; detect caffeine in solution; YFP and GFP high concentration of caffeine would repress GFP and YFP would glow; if decaf, YFP would be repressed and GFP would grow; if medium, then both would be present.

ACTIONS

March 14, 2006

• Victoria will go to SAO to get info about table for ADOCH
• possibly also a web page/link to Brown iGEM
• have a site for prospective students to see who we are, as well as our contact info
• also, for everyone: think of ways to gain more attention

• Everyone: create a section on the wiki for the category you are overseeing

• Create a community portal:
  • serve as a site that can be linked possibly from admissions page
  • emphasizing that we are cross-disciplinary undergraduates performing research at Brown University, even several freshmen involved
  • have our slightly more colorful biolographical infos attached

• Possible ideas for our project?

• Victoria/Megan doing the Journal Club presentation next week.

March 21, 2006

Come up with an idea by first meeting after Spring Break

Journal Club Presenters (in order of presentation): talk to faculty about them (we have 19!!!) send out papers to faculty early just to make sure.

Peter and Brendan 4/4

Angela and Annie 4/11

Kara and Jessie 4/18

Katherine and John 4/25