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Events

Our first big teambuilding exercise was a three-day getaway at our university's research station Svanninge Bjerge. The primary objective of the weekend was to brainstorm research ideas for our project. The weekend was a chance for all of us to get to know each other. We spent the weekend brainstorming, hiking, playing board games, cooking, and much more.

What do you get when you squeeze twelve iGEMers together for three days straight?

One hell of a good time!

After our PIs had recruited us all to iGEM, they booked us a weekend retreat for our first team-building exercise. On Friday the 10th of March 2023, we packed our bags and set out to Svanninge Bjerge, our university's research station, located in the Hills of Svanninge in southern Fyn.

The first thing on our agenda, when we arrived, was food! Cooking for twelve people and our supervisors is no easy task – but we were iGEM’ers now, and through sheer will and determination, we made a whole pizza buffet!

We spent the rest of the night sharing our iGEM aspirations and talking about the butterflies we were all feeling about this new and exciting endeavor we had signed up for.

Saturday morning was an early start – though, it was easy to get up, as we all woke up to the Danish countryside embraced in a fresh layer of powdered snow. We spent most of this day inside, with a cup of something warm, brainstorming ideas for our project. And what exciting ideas we had! Inspired by the snowfall outside, some came up with the idea of increasing frost tolerance in plants – imagine growing strawberries in the Russian Tundra! Others thought of developing vaccines against STDs and developing bio-degradable plasters. We even talked about developing biomarkers for cancer and a cactus with hair!

What piqued our interest the most, though, was these so-called PFAS chemicals… what are they? Where do they come from? And why are they slowly killing us? So, despite the competition being tough, and the votes close, we eventually settled on building upon the efforts of previous iGEM-teams USAFA 2020 and 2021, continuing their iGEM legacy of breaking down PFAS using enzymes.

We celebrated our newly found project winner by venturing out into the harsh winter landscape and enjoying the scenery. We trekked across hills and through forests, under bushes and over rocks, and ended on the tallest peak of them all. On our way home, we stumbled across an ice cream shop. Is there anything better than a nice ice cream on a cold spring day?

Come Sunday, our social batteries were low. Despite this, the atmosphere was light. We spent the morning reminiscing on the few days that have passed and laughing about all the inside jokes we now shared.

We may have arrived at Svanninge as strangers, but we left as a team.

DTU BioBrick weekend was a fun-packed weekend hosted by the Danish iGEM team: DTU!

At this event, we got to meet some of the other iGEM teams: iGEM Lund and iGEM Stockholm. Throughout the weekend, we learned a variety of different things. We spent time in the laboratory, where we tried the USER cloning technique, and we delved into programming, gaining familiarity with the Git environment and its collaborative use.

As if that wasn't enough, a brief lecture on human practices was provided. We were divided into small groups and tasked with discussing ethical considerations on various topics. This offered valuable insights into the concept of human practices.  To cap it off, we had the privilege of hearing from former iGEM participants, who shared their experiences with us.

The weekend left us ready for the iGEM journey. We acquired skills applicable to various aspects of iGEM, such as human practices and the DryLab segment. A big thank you goes out to the iGEM team of DTU!

We attended the 2023 Danish People's Meeting, which took place on the Danish Island Bornholm, with several objectives in mind. Our primary goal was to establish new contacts to guide our project in the right direction, gaining insight into how our project could be integrated into society. Additionally, we aimed to comprehend the public perception of PFAS among Danish citizens and identify any challenges we might encounter when introducing our solution to the world.

In the search for PFAS contacts

We attended several debates concerning PFAS, with most of them focusing on the presence of PFAS in our water and in the food we consume. During these events, we had the opportunity to meet with various experts and directors who shared their knowledge gained over the years, hailing from institutions such as Aarhus University, Regions of Denmark, and the Ministry of Environment. For instance, we had a meeting with Susan Münster, the Director of Danish waterworks, who informed us about the issues PFAS had caused at numerous water treatment facilities across Denmark. She discussed an extensive investigation they had conducted, spanning over Danish waterworks. According to the data, approximately 27% of all Danish water boreholes contained PFAS!

We had a lot of great conversations, which we have visualized through a video!

Is using PFAS morally correct if no alternatives are available?

During one of the debates, we also delved into the moral aspects of utilizing PFAS when there are either no PFAS alternatives or the ones available are worse contaminants than PFAS18. Currently, PFAS is incorporated into a wide range of products, including makeup, toilet paper, water protection sprays, windmill wings, and solar panels. Products such as windmill wings and solar panels play a crucial role in achieving green energy, both in Denmark and worldwide. So, would it be ethically justifiable to halt the production of these items, given their contribution to combating climate change? The discussion also touched on other topics, such as the use of PFAS in firefighters' clothing, which is necessary to keep them safe from fire. Thus, the question arises: Is it morally acceptable to eliminate such products to reduce PFAS production? The answer, in short, is no. However, it is imperative that we conduct thorough research to discover alternatives to PFAS, or as our solution proposes, employ synthetic biology to degrade PFAS! Equally important is the need to raise awareness about the PFAS issue and educate individuals on how to avoid consuming PFAS, which you also can see on our sustainable development page.

Concern among the Danish citizens

Another debate, hosted by the food company Coop, focused on PFAS and included the citizens' perspective on this issue. It became evident that the PFAS problem deeply concerned many citizens, with 80% of those who had heard about PFAS expressing concern, and 67% actively making efforts to avoid PFAS. One of the major challenges related to PFAS was its long-standing oversight, leading to a lack of knowledge regarding its side effects and where it could be found. A critical issue was that PFAS could be detected almost everywhere, making it difficult to pinpoint the sources of contamination.

So, who should take responsibility for addressing this problem? Should it fall on individuals, or should the responsibility rest with the companies that measure the amount of PFAS in their products? Someone must take the initiative to ensure safe drinking water for all people. Our proposed solution to this problem would need to be as closely connected to the source of contamination as possible, ensuring that the water we consume remains clean. This approach would be more sustainable than developing multiple devices to be implemented in different households.

Reflection on the People's Meeting

Attending the People's Meeting on Bornholm provided us with valuable insights into how our project aligns with current political, scientific, and societal norms and policies. One of our initial priorities was establishing contact with Danske Vandværker, as it presented a prime opportunity to connect with those directly affected by the issue and learn how our product could impact them. Contacts from Aarhus University and The Danish Regions also shared articles and introduced us to individuals whom we could collaborate with. This not only helped us gain deeper insights into the problem but also identified people who could guide us in the right direction.

The Nordic iGEM Conference (NiC) was held to bring together teams from the Nordic countries, to draw inspiration from each other’s projects and experiences, while also catalyzing collaboration opportunities.

NiC is an annual meetup with participants from iGEM teams of the Nordic countries: Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Finland. The event is an opportunity to practice pitches and presentations early on, network with other iGEM’ers, and exchange experiences from our iGEM journeys.

This year, we, the SDU-Denmark iGEM team, had the privilege of hosting the conference at our university. We even invited the Baltic countries because we included as many interested teams as possible! This year that included the teams from Latvia and Lithuania who travelled a long way to visit our university.

Sixty guests attended the 2023 Nordic iGEM Conference. None of us from the SDU iGEM team had any experience planning an event of this scale with guest speakers, food, social activities, and sleeping arrangements. But we enjoyed the challenge.

The days up to the event, we prepped everything – food, merchandise from sponsors, games (some made of cardboard), and presentations for the event! We even crafted unique NiC tokens for everyone to take home as a keepsake.

When our guests arrived, the fun began! The initial collaboration session helped our attendees connect. It encouraged discussions about our iGEM journey so far and the challenges we had encountered. Our Poster Session also let the attending teams connect and inquire about each other's work. A lot of the teams also found exciting ideas for collaborations.

We had arranged for Danish iGEM-legend Thøger Jensen to give a lecture about how to make the perfect Wiki. We gained much valuable insight into how to balance language for non-experts and academic terminology and how to create a nice flow on a website.

In the afternoon, communications manager and coach Christian Eiming held an engaging lecture on "Effective Project Presentations”. He drew an analogy with theater and emphasized how we take on the role of a performer during even a scientific presentation. Christian’s talk caused quite an uproar among the iGEM audience; none of us had ever thought about it that way! How do you perform scientific data? Why does it matter which clothes you wear? Surely, it must only be your data which is important! It started a discussion about how to create interest while providing solid evidence-based information.

Before NiC, we had asked the attending iGEM teams to prepare a presentation on their projects. We then held a presentation session, which was judged by previous iGEM’ers based on The Judge’s Handbook from iGEM. Following the presentations, the alumni team shared their own iGEM experiences where they emphasized the importance of team cohesion and effective communication.

On the last day, guest speaker Will Wright, who has been a part of the iGEM community for years, led a Hackathon on entrepreneurship and the UN Sustainable Development Goals. This sparked creative ideas and gave us insights into how an iGEM project could transition into a startup.

To conclude the weekend, we awarded the golden pipette to the iGEM team with the best presentation; the ABOA iGEM team from the University of Turku, Finland. We had an impromptu networking session to exchange LinkedIn, and then said our goodbyes!

NiC was truly a great team-building experience. It reminded us how crucial communication is when things get hectic, and it showed us just how valuable it is to delegate tasks effectively. We all learned a lot from this memorable iGEM gathering. Our knowledge and enthusiasm increased a bunch, leaving us feeling inspired and better prepared for our ongoing iGEM adventures.

We sent three of our eager team members to participate in JuniorJam hosted by UniMuenster. JuniorJam is a conference with iGEM teams participating from all over Europe! Among others, we socialized with teams from Finland, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium and Switzerland.

At the JuniorJam, we had the opportunity to present our project to a large international audience. Afterward, we gained valuable feedback on both our project and presentation techniques. It was also a very fun challenge to receive intriguing questions about our project.

There was a poster session where we could get even further insight into each other's projects. This was a great opportunity for networking on a personal level and gaining new outside perspectives on our project.

The weekend even included exciting lectures on synthetic biology and optogenetics.

The conference was concluded with a workshop on how to take your iGEM project from science to startup! Here, we gained valuable knowledge on what things to consider before creating a successful startup, and where to find help to launch it.

We set up a stall for three days at the 2023 Middelfart Climate People's Meeting. The summit is comprised of 150 organizers, 100 stalls, 12 stages and 275 events to bring together citizens, decision-makers, industries, and organizations and inspire climate action.

The focus of our stall was PFAS and how it impacts our drinking water. We wanted to know the viewpoint of Danish citizens regarding PFAS and GMOs. We prepared a survey on the Danes’s awareness of PFAS, concerns, and opinions. Unfortunately, the survey didn’t result in useful numbers because people who visited our stall were more interested in hearing about our iGEM project than in filling out the survey.

We participated in a discussion on what PFAS is and how Danish PFAS specialists tackle the pollution. This presentation was a great inspiration to us. The audience was captivated in the discussion by the use of visual aids. This made us decide to implement similar techniques in our pitches and presentations. We had the opportunity to speak with Emil Damgaard-Møller from Danish Technological Institute. Read more about what we learned on Human Practice.

As the days continued, we engaged in numerous conversations about PFAS. Many attendees had heard about PFAS in the news before. They were, however, surprised to discover that PFAS is present in various everyday items. Children enjoyed identifying PFAS-containing items through interactive games. Many children have not heard about PFAS before. We were delighted to see how swiftly they picked up on which type of items contained PFAS and their interest in learning more.

Finally, we also raised awareness of synthetic biology. We had many conversations centered on the benefits of using GMOs to address many of the climate-related issues in the world. We aimed to foster a positive perspective on how GMOs can assist us under safe conditions.

The People's Climate Meeting offered us more than speaking with the public. We met Anders Møller Glümer from the city council of Allerød, who had experienced the PFAS problem influencing climate action. He told us that if a house is too close to a PFAS-polluted area, the council has to decline the residents’ wish to switch to the sustainable energy source, geothermal heating, because of the process of digging. The digging would accelerate PFAS pollution to groundwater. This was a great example of the interconnection between the SDGs - and only gave us more motivation to pursue success in our project.

The People's Climate Meeting was a truly inspiring event. We discovered new perspectives on various environmental topics and encountered new questions to explore. Through our participation, we gained valuable insights into creating an information booth, designing it effectively, and capturing people's attention through visual means!

On September 16th, vitroFAS invited locals on Fyn to grab their gloves, grab-tongs, and old plastic bags to help us clean Kerteminde Beach in solidarity with International Coastal Clean Up Day.

18 volunteers showed up at 11 a.m. on a Saturday! We set out to collect all kinds of trash from the beach. We found a lot of cigarette buds, socks, and candy wrappers. Among our most interesting discoveries were PBC pipes, metal trays, and a vape battery. After two hours of collecting, we sorted the garbage to recycle at the recycling station.

During the event we focused on the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goal number 14 about Life Below Water. We talked with the participants about how trash in the ocean also pollutes in an invisible way – by releasing chemicals like PFAS.

The Beach Clean Up taught us the effort it takes to scan the environment and collect each individual piece of trash. All the participants learned the value of taking the extra few seconds to dispose of the garbage correctly.

Events

Our Path Toward a PFAS Solution

Our iGEM journey was filled with various events and experiences that had a notable impact on the course of our project. We want to share this journey and the important key moments we learned along the way.

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