Brown:March142006
From 2006.igem.org
Contents |
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, Megan
Journal Club Presentation
Construction of a Genetic Toggle Switch in E. Coli
by Victoria and Megan
- 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.
Meeting Minutes for April 4, 2006
Present: Jamie, Azime, John, Angela, Bo, Brendan, Peter, Jason, Jamie, Victoria; Elena
Journal Club Presentation
Engineering a pathway in E. Coli for turponoids, organic compound for making steroids,
by Brendan and Peter
- antimalarial medicine, etc. (anticancer, antihallucenogenic)
- purified from plants, extracted from plants and then synthesized – limits
- pathway from yeast and put into E. Coli
- PCR created 3 mutant pathways, point mutations which inserted into E. Coli
- 2 of the sequences worked; combined the two (beginning of one and end of another)
- isoprene 5C structure; double, single, double building blocks
- IPP is inhibitor that halts cell growth (for MAP)
- amorphodyein synthase consumes IPP, increases levels of mevalonate acid without halting cell growth
- pathway doesn’t exist in nature; this pathway 10-300 fold increase in production
- head of synthetic bio department of Berkeley (Gates Foundation gave lots of funding)
- Melavonatic → MevP → MevPP → IPP &→ DMAPP
genes: -ERG12 -ERG8 -MVD -1d1 = these genes are in plants but not in E. Coli, so codon optimization corrects for differences in codons between bacteria and plants
- then stepped back to beginning: melavonatic not a good precursor, so XYZ converts acetyl CoA (naturally occurring in cell and a lot *cheaper) into Melavonatic Acid (which is hard to get)
concerned about product yield and amounts of cells, so another step was making sure that [IPP] kept low à keeping cells alive as we put in genes, etc.
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. <math>Insert formula here</math>
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
