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Project Abstract

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Ionizing radiation and radiation pollution is an important environmental problem that not only affects those working around radiation facilities, but those dealing with the aftermath of widespread nuclear disasters such as those at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactor. Penn State’s team project designed and constructed a genetic circuit introduced into E. coli bacterial cells, in order to rapidly detect and report the presence of harmful ionizing radiation. We are working to create a robust and reliable biosensor that utilizes the lambda phage lytic-lysogenic switch as the radiation sensor. When the sensor detects radiation, it triggers one of three fast acting reporters we developed based on the concept developed by Imperial College’s 2010 iGEM team will be triggered. Each of the reporters features a different enzyme/substrate reaction (β-galactosodise/β-D-galactose, β-glucurodinase/β-D-glucuronide or C23O/catechol). We believe that the final construct may have the potential to rival current radiation detection methods, such as digital dosimeters.

Team

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Ben Aloudir

Junior
Biotechnology and Microbiology

Brian Avison

Junior
Engineering Science

Alex Bina

Junior
Bioengineering

Jamie Colleta

Junior
Biological Engineering

Anisha Katyal

Senior
Biology

Elyse Merkel

Senior
Engineeing Science

Byron Pierce

Senior
Chemical Engineering

Jim Rose

Senior
Biotechnology

Lauren Rossi

Senior
Microbiology

Vishal Saini

Senior
Neuroscience

Kristen Salava

Kristen is a junior majoring in bioengineering. Outside of the lab, she spends most of her time with her sorority where she is the Vice President of Standards. She also is an International Envoy within the college of engineering.

Swati Prasad

SWATI PUT STUFF HERE!!!!!!!!!!!

Mike Speer

Graduate Student

Dr.Tom Richard

Advisor
Professor of Agricultural and Biological Engineering

Dr. Howard Salis

Advisor
Assistant Professor of Agricultural Engineering

Brainstorming

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In the first few days of summer, we began discussing ideas for our project. Some of our first initial thoughts were to modify bacterial photosynthesis using the BCHM gene or to engineer a serotonin sensor. We thought about making a bacterial fuel cell by using Geobacter as a sacrificial anode. We also liked the idea of using bacteria to perform intelligent tasks, like mathematical arithmetic. The last idea we developed was to engineer a bacteria that would be able to detect radiation. The team spent a few days researching these topics to determine how plausible they would be and we finally unanimously agreed upon the bacterial radiation detector. With our full thoughts focused on this topic, we began looking into this idea further and discovered that the Penn State 2007 iGEM team had used the lambda phage system to also develop a bacteria that would test for radiation. However, they were not able to fully assemble their device or test it and we thought that we would be able to build upon their initial foundation.

Research

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Woo hoo! We love to research!

Media

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Acknowledements

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Affymetrix
Life Technologies
Penn State Institutes of Energy and the Environment
Huck Institutes of Life Sciences