Community Lab Track at iGEM- Help us define Medal Rqts!

[Ellen Jorgensen]

Hi All,

This year iGEM has added an experimental track called 'Community Labs'. I've been tapped to head the committee for this track at iGEM, and I have already reached out to many of you to help craft the requirements for entry (very minimal in terms of academic affiliation, age, etc.)

One big question remaining is what to do about the gold/silver/bronze medal requirements.

Traditionally, to medal at iGEM you have to submit a part to the registry. But community labs in Europe, for example, might not be able to do that legally. There are many projects that could enable synthetic biology without actually creating a part, and we'd like to include them in the track. Should we have medals at all? Or should the medal requirements be different (I think they are for software and Entrepreneurship track teams)?

BTW, Community Lab track teams will not be competing for other track awards like Best Materials Project but they will be eligible for the cross-track awards like Best Presentation, and the Grand Prize for the over 23 post-grad age category (unless the entire team is under 23, in which case they are in the undergrad category). There will be a specific Community Lab Track award, but the criteria are not specified yet (and I feel the more open the better).

Your thoughts about gold/silver/bronze? Especially those groups under restrictions?

[Ellen Jorgensen]

Wow, resounding silence. I had hoped to get a broader cross-section of this community involved in the discussion. Guess I will contact the labs who might enter this year directly. it's funny, when we first started Genspace in 2009, one of the big goals of the DIYBio community was to compete at iGEM. Maybe it's less relevant to you all in 2014.

[Tom Hodder]

On 7 February 2014 17:44, Ellen Jorgensen <ejorg...@genspace.org> wrote:

Wow, resounding silence. I had hoped to get a broader cross-section of this community involved in the discussion. Guess I will contact the labs who might enter this year directly. it's funny, when we first started Genspace in 2009, one of the big goals of the DIYBio community was to compete at iGEM. Maybe it's less relevant to you all in 2014.

I guess it's kind of a chicken and egg situation. I am keen to contribute to an entry by the London Biohackers, but we have been waiting for more details so we know what type of project would be eligible.

 

[Rikke Rasmussen]

Maybe we could start by defining 'Community Lab' - that would likely give us some idea of the lowest common denominator situation, what requirements can feasibly be fulfilled, etc.

So, in list form, my off the bat suggestions for items to include in such a definition:

* BSL1 or above
* 3 or more members
* (at least occasionally) accessible by public

Can we add more?

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[Koeng]

Hum, I accidentally overlooked this post

Probably just contact the DIYbio labs directly. Some of them don't come on this all that often and could have overlooked this like I did.

I don't really know about medals, just do what you think seems the best

A lot of biohacking spaces would probably love to go, but can't afford to. Perhaps enough for one year to get the parts, but i don't know a ton that could go year after year

[Jonathan Cline]

Perhaps you'd like to wait for a bit longer than 48 hours [*] before posting a near-insulting dismissal regarding a group that you spontaneously post to.  Unless you're goal is to prove in some biased way, some agenda perhaps, that this group doesn't care for an expensive and elitist competition that focuses more on t-shirts and generating half-baked AP news articles than on the scientific method. 

Quote: " It seems that they [the University iGEM team] had the unfortunate gall to suggest to their betters [the iGEM judges] that things might be done differently [that is, improve the protocols]. As we all know, education in general, and the iGEM in particular, are not about student input as much as they are about student obedience and obsequiousness.  [...] And so, a bunch of punk-ass students had the temerity to suggest that perhaps an international competition and showcase, which they stupidly thought was about science (hahahahaha), should perhaps use better scientific tools, or at least have input on such scientific tools. Such insolence had to be put down, and fortunately the judges were right there to do so."   -- http://ellingtonlab.org/blog/2012/11/09/on-apologetics/

[*] Feb 07 09:44AM - Feb 05 09:03AM


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[Patrik D'haeseleer]

Hi Ellen,

Let me add in what I had already sent to you by email earlier, for broader public debate:

I would like to see a requirement to open-source everything produced during the project. And open-sourcing the physical *materials* is probably easiest through the registry. But if some group is willing to send out plasmids for free to anyone who asks for them, that could be an alternative.

Perhaps open-sourcing of all the information, quality of documentation, and availability of materials could all be lumped into the judging criteria? So a team that submits DNA for an unproven construct back to the registry would get credit for that accordingly. But a team that publishes extensive experimental data on their construct and makes it available at cost through addgene might score much higher...

How will your projects be evaluated?

There should be clearly described judging criteria, so participants know what to expect, but they should be flexible enough to allow and reward a wide range of creative and innovative projects.

What do students need to produce?

Something related to genetically engineered machines. I wouldn't necessarily restrict the scope to just synbio constructs. An interesting piece of DIYbio hardware that would enable synbio should be acceptable as well. Someone want to simplify and reimplement MAGE, for example? Or design a lab robot that can reach into a fridge to do combinatorial assembly of parts?

Patrik

[John Griessen]

On 02/07/2014 11:44 AM, Ellen Jorgensen wrote:
> one of the big goals of the DIYBio community was to compete at iGEM.

Not mine. Collaboration is my goal.

[Nathan McCorkle]

Personally it became less relevant when I couldn't get a team together
*while still in University* (so this would have been 2008) mainly due
to the cost to participate. I never heard anything about making it
easier or cheaper to get parts, as far as I know you can't buy single
parts.

It's great that they allow 'community labs' now, if that actually
makes it easier to get into the competition. Why wouldn't they be
competing for the same medals as everyone else though?