Team:UTP-Panama/Human Practice

Human Practices Project

Introduction

At the beginning of this journey, the members of the UTP-Panama iGEM team confronted a fundamental question, the same one that all who are involved in the field of Synthetic Biology find: What is Synthetic Biology? This aspect is emphasized more in our team, being a team of members studying engineering careers, not related to biological or "life sciences".

In our own attempt to understand what is synthetic biology, for which we got a lot of help with the good information in all the sites of iGEM.org, syntheticbiology.org, SYNBERC, etc and multiple videos on youtube about what is synthetic biology, and finally the introductory lectures given by our instructor. Although we must admit that there are so broad and diverse views that converge under the term "synthetic biology", which is always a challenge to define.

Once this stage was finished, we still felt that there would not be an easy task to explain to others about what is synthetic biology. That was the point when we turn to the future applications and benefits of synthetic biology as a the right way to introduce the topic.

At the same time we began to structure and make our own project of SynBio as part of the iGEM Competition, work that led us to ask ourselves how to bring it on the best possible way, but it also appear the question of whether we were leaving something behind or if we were not covering all the aspects that we should really worry about. At this moment came the question of safety due, which made us wonder about all the institutions and agencies that should be around a draft synbio.

Then our advisors began the labor of introducing us on the issue of the implications of SynBio in all aspects of society, and they also provided reading materials as the Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues Repor (PCSBI) called "New Directions: The Ethics of Synthetic Biology and Emerging Technologies"[1] or the "Ethical Issues on Synthetic Biology"[2]. In particular, the recommendation on PCSBI left us with a some questions to solve.

From these reflections, readings and the realization of our project was born the ideas to do the outreach on synthetic biology to the inner of our university, but especially it was born from the vision of creating two tools:

a) Introducing into the field of SynBio and its basic subjects to the ones that are not familiar with this science, for which we proposed the creation of the SB UTP 1.0

b) Help people who needs to develop SynBio project at all levels, with a self-assessment tool and guidance on the most relevant aspects that you need to consider for which your project is within the regulatory, ethical, moral or institutional field, but primarily to discover what are the realities that exist around them (environment) for advancing or hindering the development of your project. Our solution for this aspect is the creation of the SB UTP PROJECT 1.0

The Problem