iGEM 2020 — Team GW_DC

[![](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2020/8/8b/HQ_page_logo.jpg)](https://2020.igem.org)

# Team:GW DC/Notebook

# Notebook

Document the dates you worked on your project. This should be a detailed account of the work done each day for your project.

### What should this page have?

* Chronological notes of what your team is doing.
* Brief descriptions of daily important events.
* Pictures of your progress.
* Mention who participated in what task.

### Inspiration

You can see what others teams have done to organize their notes:

* [2018 Munich](https://2018.igem.org/Team%3AMunich/Notebook)
* [2014 ATOMS-Turkiye](https://2014.igem.org/Team%3AATOMS-Turkiye/Notebook)
* [2014 Tec Monterrey](https://2014.igem.org/Team%3ATec-Monterrey/ITESM14_project.html#tab_notebook)
* [2014 Kyoto](https://2014.igem.org/Team%3AKyoto/Notebook/Magnetosome_Formation#title)
* [2014 Cornell](https://2014.igem.org/Team%3ACornell/notebook)

[![](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2020/8/8b/HQ_page_logo.jpg)](https://2020.igem.org)

# Team:GW DC/Engineering

# Engineering Success

### Research

In the first stage of developing our project, our team did an extensive literature review to determine current lead filtering options, as well as which bacteria best filtered lead. Once we found the bacteria we would use, we continued researching this bacteria to learn about the mechanisms through which it filters lead, as well as how we would utilize this bacteria.

### Imagine

As we learned more about the possibilities of using bacteria to filter out lead, we wanted to keep in mind our audience. Through our human practices outreach, we knew that our prioritized audience would be people currently dealing with lead contaminated water, who tended to be discriminated-against populations. We wanted to mitigate the stress in their lives surrounding lead contamination, which meant making this device as user friendly as we could.

### Design

In our quest to make our device user-friendly, we were able to incorporate the genetic engineering portion of our project. By genetically engineering the bacteria to express fluorescent proteins, we add a visual element to our device which will make the device extremely user friendly. We would use the orange fluorescent protein mOrange to express an orange color when there is still a high concentration of lead in the water. When there has been a moderate amount of lead operon activation and therefore lead filtration, the red fluorescent protein mCherry would be expressed to indicate a moderate concentration of lead in the system. When there has been a significant amount of lead operon activation and less backbones are being stimulated since there is now a small amount of lead ions in the solution, the last fluorescent protein, smURFP, will express a far red color to show that there is a low concentration of lead in the water.

Although the priority for our research and development was the biosensor and biofilter of our bacteria, we also wanted to begin developing the hardware design for our device. A three dimensional rendering of the preliminary device design was built in SolidWorks.

### Looking Forward

Unfortunately, due to COVID, our team was not able to move past the Design stage. We could not meet physically or access our university’s Mechanical Engineering Machine Shop, so we were unable to build a prototype of our device or test our system in a laboratory. Our university has announced that the spring semester of 2021 will also be a virtual semester, so we are unsure when we will be able to continue this process. In the meantime, however, we will continue to finetune our laboratory protocols and hardware specifications.

In the laboratory, we plan to test our system in several ways. First, we want to analyze the filtration activity of our bacteria in a solution of lead. We will test each of the three lead operons of varying specificity to make sure that each one activates due to a certain amount of lead in the water. We want to test the fluorescence of each fluorescent protein, to ensure that they emit detectable amounts of fluorescence. Once we are confident in our backbones, we will test them together in a pure solution of lead for their lead filtration activity. Then, we will test them in multi metal solutions. Our bacteria is unique in that the presence of other metal cations actually stimulates the filtration activity of our bacteria. We want to use a multi metal solution in order to simulate actual contaminated water that would enter the system in the real world.

Once we have determined that the system has met our standards for functionality and efficiency, we plan to test it inside our hardware device. We need to ensure that the device is able to completely contain our system, as we cannot have our risk level 2 organism contaminating the exterior environment. We will develop our hardware further to incorporate the necessary elements in order to control the placement of our system, from sealing off the input and output pipes to motorizing the different components of the device. After we have made all of the necessary design decisions for our hardware, we will build a prototype of the device. Once the prototype has been tested to be leakproof, we will test the system in our device. This will simulate the entire project, combining the biological system with the hardware that contains it.

[![](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2020/8/8b/HQ_page_logo.jpg)](https://2020.igem.org)

# Team:GW DC/Experiments

# Experiments

Describe the research, experiments, and protocols you used in your iGEM project. These should be detailed enough for another team to repeat your experiments.

If you made Parts this year, please remember to put all information, characterization, and measurement data on the Part's Main Page on the [Registry](http://parts.igem.org/Main_Page).

### What should this page contain?

* Protocols
* Experiments

### Inspiration

* [2014 Colombia](https://2014.igem.org/Team%3AColombia/Protocols)
* [2014 Imperial](https://2014.igem.org/Team%3AImperial/Protocols)
* [2014 Caltech](https://2014.igem.org/Team%3ACaltech/Project/Experiments)

[![](https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2020/8/8b/HQ_page_logo.jpg)](https://2020.igem.org)

# Team:GW DC/Results

# Results

You can describe the results of your project and your future plans here.

### What should this page contain?

* Clearly and objectively describe the results of your work.
* Future plans for the project.
* Considerations for replicating the experiments.

### Describe what your results mean

* Interpretation of the results obtained during your project. Don't just show a plot/figure/graph/other, tell us what you think the data means. This is an important part of your project that the judges will look for.
* Show data, but remember **all measurement and characterization data must also be on the Part's Main Page on the [Registry](http://parts.igem.org/Main_Page).** Otherwise these data will not be in consideration for any medals or part awards!
* Consider including an analysis summary section to discuss what your results mean. Judges like to read what you think your data means, beyond all the data you have acquired during your project.

### Project Achievements

You can also include a list of bullet points (and links) of the successes and failures you have had over your summer. It is a quick reference page for the judges to see what you achieved during your summer.

* A list of linked bullet points of the successful results during your project
* A list of linked bullet points of the unsuccessful results during your project. This is about being scientifically honest. If you worked on an area for a long time with no success, tell us so we know where you put your effort.

### Inspiration

See how other teams presented their results.

* [2014 TU Darmstadt](https://2014.igem.org/Team%3ATU_Darmstadt/Results/Pathway)
* [2014 Imperial](https://2014.igem.org/Team%3AImperial/Results)
* [2014 Paris Bettencourt](https://2014.igem.org/Team%3AParis_Bettencourt/Results)