NUS iGEM team does it again! Wins Gold and more at the 2019 iGEM Giant Jamboree
Our NUS iGEM team has showcased their project, known as E.co LIVE, at the annual iGEM Giant Jamboree in Boston USA (31st Oct to 4th Nov 2019) with outstanding results! iGEM is the world largest annual synthetic biology student competition, with over 340 teams participating from universities around the world. This was NUS’s and Singapore’s best ever showing, where the team not only clinched a Gold Medal for the project but also went on to win two special awards – the Best Foundational Advance Project and Best Part Collection Awards. Apart from this they were also nominated for the Best Poster, Presentation, Wiki, Basic Part, Composite Part and Finalist awards. They were among the top 5 teams out of 194 undergraduate teams which participated in the competition!
The NUS 2019 iGEM team in Boston. From left to right: Joanne Lim, Suhasini Iyer, Cheng Kai Lim, Sheena Chan, Low Xi Zhi, Song Chun Yang, Zhao Hao, Prof Jimmy Peng and Prof Poh Chueh Loo.
Our two special awards!
This year the NUS iGEM team came up with the project to develop innovative solutions to enable the prolonged functionality of engineered bacteria, addressing the current bottleneck which limits the use of engineered bacteria to solving real-life problems, from cleaning up our environment to diagnosing diseases. Inspired by the phenomenon of hibernation, the students developed a “ON/OFF” growth switch to allow for fine control of the activity and energy consumption of the bacteria, extending their usage and thus bringing it closer to viability. Working hard throughout the year, the team demonstrated that the growth switch worked!
Our students in action!
The team comprised of 9 highly motivated undergraduates from different faculties and disciplines, including Life Sciences, Biomedical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Computer Engineering and Architecture, working closely to achieve this outstanding results. The team was mentored by NUS faculty, Prof Poh Chueh Loo (BME), Prof Jimmy Chih-Hsien Peng (ECE), Prof Matthew Chang (Biochemistry) and Prof Yew Wen Shan (Biochemistry), along with past ex-NUS iGEMers and members at SynCTI.
We are very proud of our NUS 2019 iGEM team for their outstanding work and for being sterling ambassadors of NUS. For more information about their project, please click here (https://2019.igem.org/Team:NUS_Singapore).
If you are inspired and want to know more about NUS iGEM team, please contact A/Prof Poh Chueh Loo at poh.chuehloo@nus.edu.sg.