In October 2016, the Communist Party of China Central Committee and the State Council issued the "Healthy China 2030 Planning Outline", which states that "health is an inevitable requirement for promoting comprehensive human development and a fundamental condition for economic and social development (P.R.C., 2016). Achieving national health and longevity is an important symbol of the nation's prosperity and rejuvenation, as well as the common aspiration of all ethnic groups in the country." According to the Healthy China Research Report 2021 published by Ping An Health, there is a trend of gastrointestinal issues affecting younger individuals. As age increases, gastrointestinal discomfort becomes more prevalent, with approximately 90% of the population having experienced gastrointestinal problems. The report also indicates that public awareness of gastrointestinal function primarily focuses on nutrient absorption, digestion, and detoxification, with 19% stating a lack of understanding about gastrointestinal function.
There is still a long way to go in terms of popularizing knowledge about gastrointestinal health. In order to promote knowledge related to gastrointestinal health, SAT team has designed a combination of online and offline educational content.
Figure 1. Question: Did you know that drinking wine in moderation can have a positive effect on your health?
Figure 2. Question: Are you aware of the damage caused by excessive consumption of wine and alcohol?
Figure 3. Question: Do you have any prior knowledge of biogenic amines?
We conducted a survey on people's perceptions of the benefits and drawbacks of drinking alcohol and have received a total of 206 valid responses. The results showed that despite the fact that a majority of people chose the correct answer, there were 13.11% of people chose the wrong answer in the first question and 10.68% in the second question. When asked about people's prior knowledge of biogenic amines, more than 80% said they had never known about them. Such results tell us that both the online and offline education campaigns that we are now conducting are necessary and that the consumer community needs to be aware of the benefits and drawbacks that drinking alcohol throws at everyone.
In response to this situation, our SAT team in the iGEM competition conducts health education activities both online and offline simultaneously and promotes our project - "Amine Reducing Yeast" - to the public. Our project aims to reduce the harm caused by alcohol to human health by reducing biogenic amines in alcoholic beverages.
Offline education activities based on our questionnaire survey results and the Healthy China Gastrointestinal Health Survey Report 2021, our team planned an offline educational event with the theme "Focusing on Gastrointestinal Health", incorporating our project promotion activities. The event took place in Fahua Nanli Community, Dongcheng District, Beijing, with 25 primary school students and 15 parents in attendance. We designed the following five types of activities:
3.1 Science Popularization Classroom
In the offline education event, we organized a science popularization classroom to explain to the attending primary school students the types of prebiotics, their effects on the human body, and foods that contain prebiotics. We aimed to teach the students how to correctly supplement prebiotics.
Figure 4. Science Popularization Classroom
3.2 "Prebiotics and Probiotics" Mini Theater
To help the primary school students better understand the basic concepts and roles of prebiotics and probiotics, we designed a "Prebiotics and Probiotics" mini theater. By personifying "prebiotics," "probiotics," and "harmful bacteria," we helped the students distinguish between prebiotics and probiotics. At the end of the theater performance, we had the students come up on stage and use stickers with words matching the actors' roles to check if they truly understood the content conveyed. （Please click here for the attachment 1）
Figure 5. Performing a mini theater to showcase the difference between prebiotics and probiotics for the students.
Figure 6. Students label the attributes of probiotics and prebiotics separately.
3.3 Treasure Hunt Game
To provide a deeper understanding of foods containing prebiotics and probiotics, we designed a "Treasure Hunt" game for the children. Prior to the game, our team members hid cards featuring various food items in different corners of the classroom, and the students were divided into groups to search for them. Once a food card was found, they matched it with the corresponding description on the presentation slides. Through the process of guessing the types of foods, the audience gained a more profound impression of the various types of foods containing prebiotics and their benefits.
Figure 7. Treasure Hunt Game
3.4 Clay Modeling Game
In the Treasure Hunt game, the children familiarized themselves with various foods containing prebiotics. The clay modeling activity encouraged primary school students to unleash their imagination and create prebiotic-rich foods using modeling clay.
Figure 8. Students identify fruits containing prebiotics in the classroom and learn about their benefits.
3.5 Introducing the Team to Parents
To familiarize parents with our project - "Amine Reducing Yeast," we distributed informational brochures to all attending parents and provided an introduction to the background, significance, and prospects of the project. We also addressed any questions raised by the parents.
Figure 9. Promoting our developed modified amine-reducing yeast strain.
3.6 Activity Feedback
In this educational event, all attendees actively participated in the activities, and our team members felt the enthusiasm from the audience. Following the conclusion of the event, we received unanimous recognition and positive feedback from parents, children, and on-site staff. The activity concluded successfully.
Figure 10. Group photo at the event
4.1Brochure
In order to let more people know about our team's minus amine yeast and biogenic amines, we made this poster, which includes online educational platforms such as bilibili, TikTok, and WeChat Official Account, introducing the timeline of our project as well as the technical principles. In the project introduction section, the background, content and significance of this topic are described.
Figure 11. Brochure
4.2 Poster
We introduced the theme of the project on the poster in concise language, describing the benefits of wine consumption and the harm caused by excessive intake of biogenic amines. The QR code of our public number, as well as the QR codes of TikTok and Bilibili, were also placed on it to better scale up the users of the online education platform. The keywords of health, fruit wine and biogenic amines on the poster echo the theme of our project, which is to help realize safe drinking and healthy living through the research of amine-reducing winemaking yeast.
Figure 12. Promotion poster
4.3 Food Card
We create twelve food cards that contain prebiotics and probiotics. These food cards feature a variety of vegetables, fruits, grains, etc. on the front and our team logo on the back.The activity is designed so that students look for the food cards and correspond to the characteristics of the different foods on the lesson plan. These cards allowed the children to gain a deeper understanding of prebiotics and probiotics and to review the content of the previous science lesson.
Figure 13. Food card
4.4 Gifts
Children can redeem small gifts, which are used as incentives, for actively answering questions and for making good clay.
Figure 14. Small gift
4.5 Making clay
Allow students to use their creativity to model food containing prebiotics using clay, so that they can feel the joy of hands-on creation
Figure 15. Making Clay
4.6 Knowledge Flipchart
The flipchart mainly includes four parts, such as "What is Prebiotics", "Effectiveness of Prebiotics", "Difference between Prebiotics and Probiotics", "Foods containing prebiotics". Children were told to eat more cereals, fruits and vegetables, soybeans and legumes, which can promote the growth and reproduction of beneficial bacteria and inhibit the growth of harmful bacteria, thus helping to maintain intestinal health.
Figure 16. Knowledge leaf
5.1 WeChat Official Account
The
content of the official account has a wide
audience, and the main content is composed of three major contents, including team introduction, subject
introduction and education and popular science activities. The content is in the form of text, pictures
and videos, and the content is designed to attract a large number of interested viewers and give them a
certain in-depth understanding.
Figure 17. WeChat Official Account
5.2 Douyin/Tiktok
At present, the browsing intensity of TikTok is the largest among all social platforms. The main content we have posted on TikTok includes daily VLOGs, the introduction of each member, the process of experimental research and the experience of expert interviews.
Figure 18. Douyin/Tiktok
5.3 Bilibili
The main content of our Bilibili channel is intended to provide people with more in-depth information about our products and projects..The main content includes deeper professional content. If you want to learn about our projects directly, you can also watch videos through the Bilibili platform, as we have introduction videos on Bilibili.
Figure 19. Bilibili
5.4Xiaohongshu
The main difference between XiaoHongshu and other social media platforms is its user demographic. The main users of Xiaohongshu are many female users. Since our project products provide many benefits to women, the XiaoHongshu app is a platform where female users can easily find and understand them.
Figure 20. Xiaohongshu
5.5 Zhihu
On Zhihu, we will ask a lot of relevant questions about our projects and products. Because there are many scholars and experts on Zhihu, they can provide a lot of suggestions and revisions for our projects and products, and there will be many scholars who are attracted by our projects and products, and they will ask us a lot of questions. We're going to go through the questions one at a time.
Figure 21. Zhihu
5.6Youtube
The users of the Youtube platform are people all over the world, so we post videos about our projects and products on Youtube to make our ideas more international and comprehensive. We can also let more people know about our research.
Figure 22. Youtube
On these six platforms above, we have received nearly 1000 clicks and interactions in total, giving our team a very positive response.
The purpose of all the content on these social platforms is related, such as Douyin/Tiktok or Xiao Hongshu which aims to attract more people and traffic. So that more people can understand our project. And then you can go deeper into our project and product on Bilibili to understand it from a scientific perspective. It can also make our project products become more authoritative. Finally, you can ask us a lot of questions on Zhihu, and the scholars and experts on Zhihu can also answer them for us. These social platforms are interrelated, so every link is very important, which also has a great positive impact on the introduction and understanding of our projects and products.
The combination of online education and offline physical activities can make our project known to more people. We believe that through our unremitting efforts, we will realize the vision of "safe drinking, healthy life" in the future.
Central People's Government of the People's Republic of China. (2016). The Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council issued Outline of the "Healthy China 2030" Plan. https://www.gov.cn/zhengce/2016-10/25/content_5124174.htm