Team:KULeuven/Workshop

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WORKSHOP DNA- synthetic biology for kids

The team has organized a workshop for children aged 9-11 years old on the 17th of August in Oud-Heverlee. They have explained synthetic biology in a playful way and afterwards the children drew their own visions on synthetic biology and what they would like to create with synthetic biology.

1. MEDIA

The workshop was filmed by ROB TV and this report was recently broadcasted on their network .

2. Protocol to isolate DNA from a tomato

What do we need?

• Tomato
• Salt
• Water
• Detergent
• Ethanol (or whiskey/vodka)
• 3 bowls
• Knife (plastic for the kids)
• A whisk
• Microliter pipet and pipet tips
• Eppendorf tubes
• Filters (coffee filters)
• Funnel

How to isolate DNA?

• Cut a tomato into pieces and put it into a bowl.
• Make a solution of ... (in another bowl)
  • 5 ml Detergent
  • 1 teaspoon of salt
  • 45 ml water
• Add the solution to the pieces of tomato.
• Use the whisk to mix the solution with the pieces of tomato.
• Put the filter in the funnel and pour the tomato - solution mix in the funnel. The filtrate contains DNA.
• To make the DNA visible:
  • Pipet 0,5 ml of the filtrate in an Eppendorf tube
  • Add 1 ml of Ethanol
  • Close the Eppendorf tube
  • Turn the Eppendorf tube with a gentle movement up and down.
• The red color pellet (looks like snot) is DNA.

3. Synthetic biology: what would you create?

4. Personal experience of 'our teachers'

Alice