Team:IBB Pune/Project

We are a team initiated by students. This is our first year at iGEM and we are excited to be a part of the whole iGEM experience. We are proud to be the first student representatives of IBB at any international level competition.

We are a group of 7 undergrads currently studying biotechnology in the third, fourth and fifth years of the Integrated Master's course at IBB, University Pune. We are a bunch of creative, hardworking and enthusiastic students. The team members know each others strengths and weaknesses very well and that makes us work as a team. We hope to succeed this year in iGEM and make a mark in the field of synthetic biology at the international level.

1. Export tag synthesis and inducible export of desired proteins for in vivo simulation of the SNOWDRIFT game:

In this project, Firstly, we are planning to get the Wisconsin iGEM2008 export tag bio-bricks synthesized and standardize the induced export of proteins like beta galactosidase.The export of beta galactosidase can be used to make an in vivo simulation of the snow drift game.this system will be a great way to calculate the equilibrium concentrations of cooperators and defectors by controlling the cost and benefit ratio.The most peculiar characteristic of this system is that the cost and benefit ratio here is PROGRAMMABLE and can be measured in terms of PoPs.

2. Bacterial Turing Machines. We are trying to make Small two-state Turing machines like unary adder and attempting to build an AND gate.

Can bacteria be used as mini computational devices?We are going to find this out by testing a system made entirely out of available bio-bricks from the registry with the introduction of two AND gates. Our primary goal is to make simple two state Turing machine like a unary adder.We will also be working on the more complicated Turing machines and also on the ways by which we could connect different two state Turing machines in combination.

3. Inducible Natural Competence

This project bears the primary goal of introducing new competence inducing genes (com) to the registry. Competence genes enhance the automated uptake of surrounding genes and further expression.These genes are derived from naturally competent bacteria. The biobricks produced can be used to form competent bacteria which do not have to be induced to take up foreign DNA by chemical means and hence can become permanently competent. Competent bacteria can simply be grown. In addition, bacterial competence coded by a biobrick can be used as a crucial component in cell to cell signalling systems and can even be used to facilitate RNA based signalling between two cells.