Education
Our 2023 iGEM team carried out three major initiatives to educate the public about our project, synthetic biology, and science in general. First, our team embarked on a collaborative effort with Wright State University to bring various science-related activities to children in Dayton, Ohio, at The Boonshoft Museum of Discovery. Second, we collaborated with Wright State University to bring a similar set of science-related activities to children in Columbus, Ohio at the Center of Science and Industry (COSI).
And finally, our team independently brought our initiative to WestFest, an annual event held by The Ohio State University to highlight STEM research and sustainability. Each of these events aimed to create an interactive space where young minds could explore scientific concepts while fostering a two-way dialogue with the community and were in line with our ongoing commitment to shaping the future of synthetic biology.
Our collaboration with Wright State University gave us access to a broader range of resources and expertise. New perspectives on our project were gained from our collaboration with Wright State University because of our openness to sharing ideas and experiences. For example, Wright State inspired how we presented our educational efforts on social media. This helped us improve our project and learn new skills.
Through our collaboration, we were able to access more resources to reach a wider audience of children with our educational efforts. This is because each team had its network of contacts and resources. Meetings between the teams consisted of deliberating the best educational activites to ensure students learn about science and synthetic biology. This helped to improve the quality of educational programs and make them more effective.
Make Your Own Lava Lamps:
Our iGEM team brought the “Make Your Own Lava Lamp” activity to Boonshoft, COSI, and WestFest and it was a hit amongst the children. The lava lamp station was a hit among the children. We initially chose this activity to introduce the idea that water and oil are immiscible solutions and connect it to the working of the type three secretion system in the gut. We represented the oil to be our gut and the water to represent proteins. We used the alka seltzer to demonstrate how a type three secretion system secrets the proteins into our gut when the oil and water layer mix together. This was one of our favorite stations to perform, and believe other teams will find a similar interest in using this activity.It is simple and captivating to children but also because we were able to connect it to our project in a more understandable way to the children and also introduce the idea of using bacteria in a beneficial way.
To make your own lava lamp all you need is an empty plastic bottle, vegetable oil, water, food coloring, and an alka seltzer tablet.
Instructions for making a lava lamp are as follows:
1. Fill an empty water bottle halfway with water.
2. Fill the bottle the rest of the way full with vegetable oil.
3. Add a few drops of food coloring to the bottle.
4. Add an alka seltzer tablet to the bottle.
5. Place the cap on the bottle and mix the contents.
The children were able to choose their favorite color to mix into the water, which represented the proteins in our gut. The children were then able to take their lava lamps home with new knowledge on the topic. However, there was feedback suggesting that making the experiment visually more appealing, perhaps by creating lava lamp designs, could enhance the overall experience. We faced a challenge with the availability of materials, particularly vegetable oil, due to the popularity of this station. To address this, we plan to ensure an ample supply of oil and provide assistance to younger children who found it challenging to shake the bottles. At Boonshoft we faced the issue of not being able to explain the connection between our activity and synthetic biology. We made sure to change this for the future events such as Westfest where we designated two team members to explain our project more in depth to the adults while two other members engaged the children in a simplified explanation about proteins. Although we had some adults engage with the hands-on activity, our project was more popular with the children. With younger children, we were able to explain essential concepts of the project like what bacteria are, what they do and had conversations about how we can use bacteria in a beneficial context. To the adults that were more interested about the science behind our project, we spoke in detail to explain the mechanism of Type III secretion systems in bacteria and the possibility of using it to treat current human disorders that result from misfolded proteins.
Using a 200 uL pipet, we taught children the fundamentals of pipetting, as it is a crucial part in many biological related projects especially in bacterial and molecular biology, and dilutions all at once. This again was a simple experiment which the children greatly enjoyed. Each child was able to pipet different volumes of water concentrated with red food coloring into cups of plain water, while members of our team taught them the scientific principles underlying what they were doing. Participants found the science behind micropipetting to be simple and easy to explain. This station seemed to run smoothly with no major issues reported.
The volcano demonstration garnered attention from both children and adults. This experiment was conducted solely by members of our iGEM due to the explosive nature of the experiment. However, there was still significant involvement with the children and adults present. We decided to use this demonstration as we could use it to relate to our project and the transport of proteins through the Type III Secretion needle as represented in our project. We hoped that the volcano demonstration would illustrate the needle in a more understandable way to children. The experiment was conducted every half hour, with a thourough explaination of reaction occuring being given each time.
Instructions for preparing a volcano are as follows:
1. Add 400 ml of vinegar to an empty 16 oz bottle.
2. Add 100 ml of warm water to the same bottle.
3. Add 10 ml of dish soap to the same bottle.
4. Add a few drops of food coloring to the same bottle.
5. Fill a different empty 16 oz bottle half way with water and half way with baking soda. Mix thouroughly, and once ready pour as much as you'd like into the first bottle for an explosion.
To teach children about the gastrointestinal tract and microbes in an interactive way, with the assistance of AI, the team came up with a game to play called "Microbe Mission." The objective of the game is to help the friendly gut microbes (beneficial bacteria) travel through the gastrointestinal tract and protect the body from harmful pathogens by understanding how type three secretion systems work. The iGEM members that act as "harmful pathogens" could be substituted out if others were to play this game.
The procedure will need the following materials:
1. Diagram of the gastrointestinal tract which includes the mouth, esophagus, stomach, small intestine, large intestine, and rectum.
2. Small plush toys or figurines representing friendly gut microbes and harmful pathogens.
3. Bean bags or soft balls (representing nutrients) to throw into a basket and move along the GI tract.
4. A representation of the Type III Secretion System
The procedure will need the following game set-up:
1. Lay out tape on the ground to represent the gastrointestinal tract.
2. Place the plush toys or figurines at the starting point of the mouth and a few harmful pathogens (could use iGEM members) and along the tract.
3. Spread the "nutrients" (small balls or squishy objects) along the GI tract.
4. Have the toy syringe ready to use at a specific location (representing where Type III Secretion Systems operate).
Finally, the activity will procede under the following instructions:
1. Divide the kids into groups and assign each group a friendly gut microbe plush toy as their "team member."
2. Explain the importance of the gastrointestinal tract and how friendly gut microbes help protect the body from harmful pathogens.
3. Tell the kids that their mission is to guide the friendly gut microbe through the GI tract and collect nutrients while avoiding harmful pathogens.
4. Each group takes turns to collect a bean bag or soft ball from the floor, moving the plush toy microbe along the GI tract to collect nutrients.
5. If the microbe encounters a harmful pathogen, a member from the group must toss one of their bean bags into a cornhole to be given a question about what they have learned earlier during the day to proceed. The higher the difficulty of the cornhole scored, the easier the question. For example, "What is the function of Type III Secretion Systems?" (The answer can be provided in advance: Type Three Secretion Systems help some bacteria inject toxins into host cells.)
6. If the group answers correctly, they can neutralize the pathogen and continue the journey.
7. The game continues until each group successfully guides their friendly gut microbe through the entire GI tract, learning about Type III Secretion Systems along the way.
This activity was not implemented at any of the events since it did not match the demographic enough to be valuable.
Our team prepared the poster depicted below at Boonshoft, COSI, and WestFest to educate people about our project and general synthetic biology techniques that we are using. The poster was a 'station' within our booth which was staffed at all times with members of our team to explain our project. The poster allowed visitors to examine an overview of our project and ask questons based on what they learned about. We had great conversations with those who stopped by and they were very interested in how the idea could affect future medicine.
While we intend to continue visiting COSI, Boonshoft, and WestFest, we believe that there are ways to improve our education standards:
1. Enhanced Visual Appeal: We plan to make the experiments more visually appealing in future outreach events to further captivate the children's interest.
2. Adequate Supplies: Ensuring an adequate supply of materials, especially for popular stations like the lava lamp, will be a priority. Additionally, we will continue to provide assistance to younger participants when needed.
3. Reduced Wait Times: To keep children engaged and minimize waiting times, we aim to optimize the lava lamp station by facilitating the participation of more children simultaneously.
4. Parental Involvement: To cater to varying levels of parental involvement, we will develop a script or supplementary materials that can guide children through experiments independently. We can also create a short survey that parents can take a few minutes to respond to guage their interest in our project and how we can improve our interactions with their children.
5. Educational Storytime: We intend to include brief educational interludes between volcano demonstrations, focusing on the type three secretion system to ensure that children leave with a broader understanding of synthetic biology.
6. Interlinking Activities: We are focused on enhancing the connectivity of activities to foster a strong connection with the field of synthetic biology. Our objective is to cultivate a community of enthusiastic learners who will develop a profound interest in synthetic biology in the years to come. Through interactive discussions with children, we aspire to draw inspiration from their perspectives and curiosity, fueling our own desire to delve deeper into the subject.
Our collaborative effort with Wright State at the Boonshoft and COSI events provided valuable experience for both our team and the community. We witnessed the enthusiasm of children exploring synthetic biology concepts and engaged with parents interested in our work. Many children asked if they could perform these experiments at home and we briefly explained to the parents that they could perform the experiments and follow the procedures we created. We also enjoyed engaging the younger kids in conversation about fun foods that contain protein such as dinosaur chicken nuggets and eggs. Parents loved that the activity was simple and something that can be done with supplies from home as well. Additionally, the older participants really enjoyed learning about our iGEM project that we are bringing to competition this year. We asked participants to fill out a survey from a QR code that asked about their experience in learning from us. From the results of the survey, we learned that participants were interested in learning more about iGEM, synthetic biology, and Type III Secretion Systems. Moving forward, we are excited to implement the lessons learned and continue our mission of shaping the future of synthetic biology education and outreach.
