Team:Cambridge/Team/Students

Cambridge Students

Marta Bozek

Marta

I finished the second year of Natural Sciences at Cambridge University and I plan to specialize in Genetics from October, being particularly interested in different methods of regulating gene expression. The iGEM experience was especially valuable for me because it allowed me to get a glimpse into the world of real science and showed how fascinating the work in the lab can be! During the project I was mainly involved in the wet work, especially enjoying sealing gel tanks, vortexing and laborious pipetting. Apart from biology, I'm interested in modern art and underground Polish music scene.

Xin Gao / Heather

Heather

I just finished my second year engineering course, still haven't quite decided which area of engineering to specialize in. In the past one and half week, I enjoyed roaming the unfamiliar territory of synthetic biology despite the steep learning curve.

Joe Harvey

Joe

Soon-to-be third year maths student intent on wheedling his way into the world of biology. Known for occasional outbursts of nonsense and his addiction to pool.

Matthew Jones

Matt

Biological Natural Sciences - I've just finished my second year of Natural Sciences here at Cambridge University. So far I have studied modules in Cell Biology, Evolution and Behaviour, Plant Physiology, Animal Physiology, Neurobiology and Developmental Biology. iGEM has so far introduced me to lots of Biology that is outside of the courses I have studied in the last couple of years and I have really enjoyed stepping outside of my comfort zone and building a working 8x8 LED matrix my first Arduino project and getting stuck into some computer programming with the Microsoft Research team. I have high hopes for our team this summer.

Haydn King

Haydn

I have just finished second year Engineering at the University, and am likely to be studying Information and Computer Engineering next year. Having no biological training since GCSE, I was very interested to learn more about the subject during the course of this project. I am particularly interested in the parallels which can be drawn between computation 'in silico' and that which can be done within a living cell.

I come from a small village called Brechfa near Carmarthen in south west Wales, and am a fluent Welsh speaker.

Catriona McMurran

Cat

Soon to be a third year Biochemist, currently learning more than anyone needs to know about what a squid looks like on the inside. Thanks to iGEM I have become mildly obsessed with the number of followers on the team's Twitter feed, and have read so much about reflectins I can pull references out of my ears. Having studied mostly pure biology in my degree so far, I'm finding the engineering-based approach of synthetic biology really interesting.

Jonathan Very

Jonathan

I'm a Natural Scientist who's specialised in the most abstruse of all the Biological subjects: Biochemistry (I like to think of it as being like the 'particle physics' of life). My role in the group is to document the peculiar and often amusing things that go on our lab (see the blog), track down ex-iGEMers and charm them into taking our questionnaire (see the 'society' page) and occasionally put what little biological skill I've gleaned from my two years' study into some labwork. When not doing such things I can be found playing and performing Renaissance lute pieces, and writing fiction.

Katy Wei

Katy

I'm a physicist who has not encountered biology since GCSE times, and I joined iGEM fearing that I wouldn't contribute any useful knowledge to the group - to my pleasant surprise, however, the physics of optics proved extremely important in our project. IGEM was a great experience for me to get familiar with biological research, and I really enjoyed getting my hands dirty in the wetwork too. Impressively, the field seems to me even more mysterious and open-ended than current research in theoretical physics, which I was previously looking to specalise in. I now confess to being a complete convert, and am looking forward to working in biophysics in the future!

Felix Zhou

Felix

An excitable engineer who 'boos' with a House mentality