Team:NYC Wetware/Deinococcus/Expert Opinions

Expert Opinions

Early on in our project, we sought out the shoulders of giants to stand on. We contacted a host of experts in the field of radiation resistance. We foremostly aknowledge Drs Frederick Domann (http://www.uiowa.edu/~frrbp/domann.html)and Matthew Fritzgerald (http://www.uiowa.edu/~frrbp/directory.html) from the University of Iowa who opened our eyes to T. cruzi and then filled our hands with some T. cruzi plasmids to go; Dr. John Battista (http://www.biology.lsu.edu/faculty_listings/fac_pages/jbattista.html) of Wayne State University for teleconferencing us; Dr. Michael Daly (http://www.usuhs.mil/pat/deinococcus/index_20.htm) of Unites Services University of the Health Sciences for collaborating with us on the Deino Genomics; Mr. Stephen Marino (http://www.raraf.org/marino.htm) of Columbia University’s RARAF facility for guiding us in the use of his Particle Radiation Facility.

In addition to these professors, we benefited from correspondences with the following radiation biology scientists:

Dr. Suzanne Sommer (http://www.igmors.u-psud.fr/spip.php?article422), Institut de Genetique et Microbiologie
Dr. Eli Glatstein (http://www.xrt.upenn.edu/EliGlatstein.shtml), University of Pennsylvania
Dr. Jim Imlay (http://mcb.illinois.edu/faculty/profile/1189), University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Dr. John Helmann (http://micro.cornell.edu/research/labs/helmann-lab/index.cfm), Cornell University
Dr. Michael Cox (http://www.biochem.wisc.edu/faculty/cox/lab/default.aspx), University of Wisconsin at Madison
Dr. Valery Verbenko (http://www.labome.org/expert/russia/petersburg-nuclear-physics-institute-33402.html), Petersburg Nuclear Physics Institute
Dr. Juliann G. Kiang (http://www.usuhs.mil/rad/kiang.html), United Services University of the Health Sciences
Dr. Lewis Dartnell (http://www.lewisdartnell.com/), University College London
Dr. Steve Blattnig, NASA Langley Research Center
Dr. Janice Huff (http://www.dsls.usra.edu/huff.html), Universities Space Research Association
Dr. Cary Zeitlin (http://www.swri.org/iProfiles/ViewiProfile.asp?k=2i1x9021ek22ml9), South West Research Institute
Dr. Susan Lovett (http://www.bio.brandeis.edu/faculty/lovett.html), Brandeis University

Expert Brainstorming

Before choosing our project, we brainstormed ideas, and acknowledge Dr. David Deamer (http://www.soe.ucsc.edu/people/deamer) of the University of California at Santa Cruz for several teleconference calls trying to help us down the exciting protocoll project road; and finally we were excited to meet Dr. Albert Libchaber (http://www.rockefeller.edu/research/faculty/labheads/AlbertLibchaber/) of Rockefeller University, who hosted a conversation with representatives of the three New York City iGEM teams all about synthetic biology, protocells and biological physics.