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From 2011.igem.org

The Synthetic Biology 5.0

Conference better known as SB 5.0 was conducted at Stanford University and was a huge success. For the iGEM Team Panama were the brothers and Ernesto and Natasha. They had the opportunity of being in the scientific environment of the highest level and able to meet legends in the field of molecular biology as: Hamilton Smith and Dan Gibson J. Craig Venter Institute and the same Foundation President Drew Endy BioBrick and Andrew Hessel. To exchange ideas, laughter and a passion for synthetic biology with other iGEMers as Max Song (iGEM Brown-Stanford), Alyssa Henning (iGEM Cornell and now at GinkoBioWorks, Congrats Alyssa!!!), Tom Richard and Michael Speer from ( PennState), Suguru Asai and Laury Vanagas (iGEM Hokkaido Japan) and many other good young scientists.

The conference was a barrage of presentations of the highest scientific level and the workshops were very useful to start using the tools of design and construction of parts, devices and biological systems that evolution by natural selection never saw coming.

Motivated by this experience and that of iGEM, in Panama we are starting a revolution based on the premise that knowledge is good and more knowledge is better by also called for a multidisciplinary approach.

Because of this we as a team captured the attention of the authorities of our University to start a lab group working on synthetic biology that works throughout the year not only in the iGEM competition period that collides with both Latin American agenda.

Finally the biggest success of the SB 5.0 and the iGEM experience recurrences in the enthusiasm, love of science and self-organization of young scientist like us and inspire more young people to enter the scientific world.