Source: School of Life Sciences

The global finals of International Genetically Engineered Machine Competition (iGEM), a top-notch competition in synthetic biology, were held at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) last month. After winning the gold medal in Asia Regional Jamboree in October,the team SYSU-Software won Best Clotho App and Best Genome Compiler-Based Design (there were eight awards in total), which means they had received the highest number of awards compared with other Asian teams. It’s also a historic breakthrough since SYSU participated in the iGEM competition.

The SYSU-Software team is made up of 14 undergraduates including Jiang Shan, Guo Jiexin, Chen Shuo, Ma Qianheng and Wen Junqiang from School of Life Sciences, School of Information Science and Technology, School of Software, and School of Mathematics & Computational Science. SYSU-Software has successfully developed a novel software platform, BiArkit, to solve one of the most challenging problems for synthetic biologists - how to integrate high throughput biological information to design artificial organisms automatically. BiArkit consists of three parts, G-Lens, G-Switch and G-Meter, which enables researchers to design and construct synthetic organisms based on the engineering hierarchical levels from genes, parts to systems.

The team members presented the overall optimization and development software system full of confidence during the competition. Professor Douglas Densmore from Boston University, Chairman of Software Division, appreciated SYSU-Software’s work. He thought BiArkit had provided a comprehensive and systematic vision for researches, and the teammates made their contribution to synthetic biology. Assistant Professor Gil Alterovitz from Harvard Medical School and MIT asked for the software details about the processes of designing and developing. He praised the teammates for their abilities, and also invited them participating in his interdisciplinary project.

On October 6 and 7, under the guidance of teachers from School of Life Sciences, the software team SYSU-Software won gold medal and the experiment team SYSU-China won silver medal in Asia region. This is the second year for SYSU students to join the iGEM World Championship Jamboree, which reflects the potential advantages of SYSU in Bioinformatics, demonstrates the rigorous attitude toward scientific research of SYSU students and the university spirit of collaborative innovation with the combination of talent cultivation and scientific research. The excellent performance cannot be separated from the support of many departments, teachers and students. The State Key Laboratory of Biocontrol (SKLBC) and Guangdong Province Key Laboratory of Computational Science co-launched this program, SKLBC made specific plans for recruiting and training team members. The instructors of experiment and software teams are Professor He Xionglei, Professor Ren Jian, Associate Professor Huang Shengfeng, Associate Professor Yang Jianhua, Associate Professor Zhang Yongdong, Associate Professor Huang Junjiu. During the preparation and competition, the School of Life Sciences has always provided organizational support and guidance. At the same time, the teams also received enormous support from University Dean's Office, SYSU Youth Association, the Key Laboratory of Gene Engineering of Ministry of Education, School of Information Science and Technology, School of Software, and School of Mathematics & Computational Science.

Synthetic biology is a rising interdisciplinary which appears in the 21st century, belonging to leading edge discipline of Life Sciences. Synthetic biology uses the concepts and methods of Systems biology, electronic engineering and other areas to create engineered organism which can do signal processing and precision control. iGEM has become a top international university students' science and technology competition in the field of synthetic biology with considerable international influence. Every year, journals like Nature, Science, Scientific American, Economists and such traditional media as BBC will focus on IGEM competition, and give thematic reports.

Over 170 teams from 40 countries participated in the competition this year, including the world's top universities such as MIT, Harvard University, University of Cambridge, Yale University, and Stanford University. Asia teams include University of Tokyo, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Peking University, Tsinghua University, Sun Yat-sen University, University of Science and Technology of China, and Shanghai Jiaotong University.