US meetup with MolecularCloud: University of Rochester iGEM & Stony Brook iGEM

Josemary Medrano from MolecularCloud/GenScript kindly invited us to a US virtual meetup for participating teams in the MolecularCloud sponsorship. Members of our team were delighted to reflect on our iGEM experience so far with Josemary and the University of Rochester (UR) iGEM team. During the meetup, each team discussed our projects, challenges this year, and where we see our work in the future. As we were discussing how this year was completely different from what we had expected, we realized all the good things that came from doing research work while in quarantine. Our team members Julia and Alexis mentioned that the loss of wet lab access this summer enabled us to focus heavily on our design. Since our research subteam spent most of their time this summer reading articles and working on the design, they were able to realize that our initial proposed design with BphP1 would not work. With the help of our advisors, we were able to refine our project so that the design would certainly work. Another great point that was brought up during the meeting was how our team was able to use Discord in order to create structure for our team. Since we were unable to meet up in person, we needed a proficient way of communication so that everyone on the team would be aware of what was happening. We were able to achieve this through Discord and it’s division of channels. Furthermore, we discussed how having multiple subteams as well as subteam leaders helped us create a better structure and order to our work. Lastly, when we were discussing where we see our project in 5 years, Gabe from RU brought up a great point. Gabe pointed out that unless someone notices our projects and continues the work, our research is not likely to survive 5 years from now. The thing that will survive, though is the education and public engagement we provide to our community.