The United Nations, with its 193 member states, established 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) during the 2015 United Nations Sustainable Development Summit. These SDGs aim to comprehensively address development issues across the social, economic, and environmental dimensions from 2015 to 2030.

The Fudan iGEM 2023, as an advocate and user of synthetic biology technology, has consistently emphasized the principles of sustainable development throughout the progress of the B.HOME project. We have integrated the relevant SDGs concepts into a series of educational and human practice activities related to our project. Through our activities, we aim to enhance the influence of SDG-related concepts among the public. To align with the B.HOME project's objectives, we have focused on implementing SDG4 - quality education and SDG15 - life on land.

Furthermore, as the project has advanced, we've come to realize that SDGs are closely intertwined with our lives. Therefore, implementing SDGs concepts into our project's human practices, education, experiments, and other aspects may yield more significant results than solely designing SDG-related social activities.

SDG4 Quality Education

SDG4 - quality education reflects the importance placed by UN member states on inclusive, equitable, and quality education, as well as equal educational opportunities for all. We believe that the quality of education in a region is not only reflected in statistical figures such as adult literacy rates and mean years of schooling but also requires consideration of the richness of high-quality educational resources in different regions. The popularity of interest courses, such as synthetic biology and astronomy, involved in the B.HOME project, is a good example of this on a societal level.

To promote the widespread availability of educational resources in synthetic biology and related interdisciplinary fields, under the call of Fudan iGEM 2023, iGEM teams from universities in the Yangtze River Delta region formed the Yangtze River Delta iGEM Alliance. Through the dedicated efforts of every iGEMer, we spread our efforts from the Yangtze River Delta to the entire country gradually, fully understanding differences in educational levels between regions through activities such as distributing surveys and hosting luncheon parties. Subsequently, we conducted corresponding activities based on the educational characteristics of different regions and age groups. Please visit our Education page for more details.

Through our efforts, we could attempt to minimize the negative impact of educational resource inequalities between regions, allowing everyone to have the opportunity to enjoy diverse interest courses. Furthermore, we expect that the Yangtze River Delta iGEM Alliance can shoulder the great mission of spreading synthetic biology and continually expand its influence in the future, showing the charm of science to more people.

SDG15 Life on Land

SDG15 - life on land emphasizes the sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, primarily including sustainable forest management and combating desertification, among other aspects. And lichens (opens new window), as the inspiration for our project, play a vital role in the regeneration and restoration of terrestrial ecosystems. Therefore, although the primary goal of the B.HOME project is to achieve the terraforming of terrestrial planets and create a second home for humans, it doesn't mean that the biofilm we have developed isn't applicable to Earth's environment. On the contrary, we firmly believe that our biofilm can excel in desert management, sand fixation, and soil stabilization.

In interviews with Dr. Jingwei Zhang from the School of Life Sciences at Fudan University, our ideas have been recognized and further supplemented (refer to our Human Practices page for more details). In our conception, on one hand, the biofilm we engineered can accelerate the primary succession of ecosystems in hostile environments to mitigate the negative impacts of excessive industrialization on human society. On the other hand, in contrast to traditional lichens, our biofilm exhibits greater resilience, reducing the likelihood of its demise in harsh environments. We consider that our biofilm can play a positive role in the recovery of terrestrial ecosystems and mitigate the greenhouse effect on Earth through vegetation regeneration.

Furthermore, in our activities, we repeatedly emphasize the concept that "seeking a second home doesn't mean ignoring the destruction of Earth", which has been a consensus among team members. B.HOME isn't only a pioneer in lighting the torch of life on another planet like Prometheus (opens new window), but also an implementer of protecting terrestrial ecosystems and addressing the climate crisis. Through this project, we expect that the audience can think more deeply about the dialectical relationship between humans, Earth, and space, enhance their awareness of SDGs-related concepts, and put them into practice.

"searching for a second home" VS "protecting our earth"