The 2021 iGEM competition showcases the excellent scientific cooperation between Singapore, France and in particular with the CNRS.
The 2021 iGEM competition showcases the excellent scientific cooperation between Singapore, France and in particular with the CNRS.
Prestigious scientific competitions have been growing internationally over the years. They cover all kinds of scientific research fields such as AI, robotics, synthetic biology, and many others. In the synthetic biology field, the most famous competition is iGEM: the International Genetically Engineered Machine. The iGEM Foundation is an independent, non-profit organization dedicated to the advancement of synthetic biology, education and competition, and the development of an open, collaborative, and cooperative community. It is a worldwide synthetic biology competition initiated in 2003 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), that was initially aimed at undergraduate university students. It now includes divisions for high school students, entrepreneurs, and community laboratories, as well as ‘overgraduates’.
7,000 participants running for the iGEM Grand Prize Award
Started 19 years ago, this competition hosts 350 teams with over 45 countries participating, and more than 7,000 participants. The students are working on using biological systems to address societal issues. Originally held at MIT and in Paris in October 2022, iGEM has become a key competition in synthetic biology for the world’s top schools and universities, among which the National University of Singapore, Paul-Sabatier University (Toulouse, France) and INSA Toulouse.
The latest edition of iGEM gathered over 7,000 participants. Credits: iGEM.
Team iGEM Toulouse 2021: Elixio, a sustainable project
Undergrad Grand Prize winner!
Left to right, top to bottom: Romane Ducloux, Thomas Gaudin, Margaux Haon, Maxence Holtz, Camille Pin, Manon Theys (and Violette) are the six students from Paul-Sabatier University and Toulouse National Institute of Applied Sciences (INSA) who won the iGEM Undergrad Grand Prize in 2021. Credits: iGEM.
From left to right: Brice Enjalbert (Professor, TBI), Ambre Jousselin (Professor, CBI), Pierre Millard (Researcher, TBI), Cédric Montanier (Researcher, TBI), Denis Jallet (Researcher, TBI). They all supervised the iGEM Toulouse team, providing them with their best advice. Credits iGEM.
From left to right: Younes Bouchiba (PhD student, TBI), Amandine Lucchin (PhD student, LRSV), Thibault Malfoy (PhD student, TBI). The 3 PhD students followed and guided the iGEM Toulouse team during the competition. Credits iGEM.
The Toulouse INSA-UPS iGEM team received the Grand Prize for their Elixio project: congratulations! Credits: iGEM Toulouse Team.
Team iGEM NUS 2021: PRYSM, a project applied to the agricultural context
Undergrad 1st Runner Up! Winner of Best BioManufacturing Award, Best Part Collection Award and Best Wiki Award.
The PRYSM research team, composed of students from NUS. From Left to right, top to bottom: Tania, Vedant, Hung, Yilin, Sriram, Yidou, Kay Mei, Chin Wei, Linus, Andrew. Credits: iGEM.
From left to right: Chueh Loo POH (Lead PI, Professor, NUS), Jimmy PENG (Professor, NUS), Dao Viet LINH (Research Fellow, NUS), Jingyun ZHANG (Research Fellow, NUS). They all supervised and guided the iGEM NUS team during the competition. Credits iGEM.
From left to right: Cheng Kai LIM (Lead student mentor, PhD student, NUS), Sheena CHAN (PhD student, NUS). The 2 PhD students guided the iGEM NUS team during the competition. Credits iGEM.
On their iGEM webpage dedicated to PRYSM, the team stated: “We chose to use Human Beta Defensin 2 (HBD2) as our primary candidate due to several reasons. Firstly, functional recombinant HBD2 has been demonstrated expressed using S.cerevisiae. However, to date, no practical application of recombinant HBD2 has been attempted. Furthermore, most works regarding antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) and HBD2 have been focused on the therapeutic field. We decided that it would be interesting to test the broad-spectrum antimicrobial activity demonstrated in medical research in the agricultural context. Lastly, HBD2 is native to the human body, rendering it extremely human-safe.”
PRYSM logo. During the iGEM competition, every detail counts – logos included! Credits: iGEM NUS Team.
In Singapore, the CNRS IRP SynBioEco & CNRS@CREATE EcoCTs bioeconomy projects are already running
The French and Singaporean iGEM teams, respectively 1st and 2nd of the 2021 Undergraduate division, demonstrated their excellence in the synthetic biology field.
The Singaporean team is composed of students and supervisors from SynCTI and NUS Engineering.
As a matter of fact, these Singaporean and French entities already collaborate in the synthetic biology field in Singapore with two ongoing projects: SynBioEco and EcoCTs.
The CNRS International Research Project SynBioEco
The CNRS IRP SynBioEco, standing for Synthetic Biology for a Bio-inspired Economy, associating the Toulouse Biotechnology Institute, CNRS – INRAE – INSA and the Synthetic Biology for Clinical and Technological Innovation (SynCTI), National University of Singapore), started in 2019. The project also collaborates with A*STAR’s Singapore Institute of Food and Biotechnology Innovation (SIFBI) and TWB (Toulouse White Biotechnology, CNRS – INRAE – INSA).
Dr Thomas Lautier and PhD student Aurélie Bouin, from the CNRS SynBioEco IRP project. Credits: CNRS in ASEAN.
The CNRS@CREATE EcoCTs project
EcoCTs – Engineering biology for a circular bioeconomy – Towards urban sustainability – is a CNRS@CREATE project involving NUS and A*STAR on the Singaporean side, and TBI (CNRS – INRAE – INSA) on the French side. The project started in October 2020, for 3 years, and is co-led by Dr Isabelle André (TBI-CNRS) and Prof. Chueh Loo Poh (SynCTI-NUS).
EcoCTs project aims at increasing the knowledge-based understanding of biotransformation efficiency, dramatically accelerating the discovery to application pipeline. Specifically, the project addresses three complimentary aspects along the value-chain in a unified and coherent manner, drawing on the existing expertise of the partners: Exploring novel enzyme engineering to create improved enzymatic activities and the spatial structuration of novel synthetic pathways to ensure high efficiency throughput; Developing innovative experimental and computational methods to design and pragmatically optimise metabolic pathways; Integrating experimental and computational methods for bioprocess optimisation.
The use of common biological transformation models throughout ensures the overall coherence of this systematic programme and lead to increase competitivity of the biotechnology effort in Singapore, moving Singapore towards a leading green low-waste liveable city in a circular bio-economy context. EcoCTs held their midterm meetings in Singapore earlier this year, after a long period of virtual meetings.
The EcoCTs team gathered in CREATE Tower, Singapore, for their midterm meetings in June 2022. Credits: CNRS@CREATE.
Next stop for iGEM: Paris in October 2022!
The next edition of iGEM will take place in Paris, on 26-28 October 2022, with more than 7,000 participants. Students, academics, investors, industry reps, journalists, and the public will convene for this 3-day world expo of synthetic biology in Paris, France. 350+ iGEM teams will present their projects to the world, and on the final day, the top projects will be celebrated with prizes and medals. The program is complemented by side events, including the Startup Showcase.
RoboCup, another scientific competition proving the excellency of CNRS on the international stage
RoboCup 2022 – the Robot World Cup Initiative, just awarded the world champion trophy in the “@Home” category to RoboBreizh, a National Engineering School of Brest (ENIB) team. Prof Cedric Buche, part of the RoboBreizh team, is also a member of the CNRS IRL CROSSING in Australia.
Sources:
https://www.inrae.fr/actualites/equipe-toulousaine-championne-du-monde-biologie-synthetique
https://2021.igem.org/Main_Page
https://jamboree.igem.org/2021/results
https://2021.igem.org/Team:Toulouse_INSA-UPS
https://2021.igem.org/Team:NUS_Singapore/Team
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Genetically_Engineered_Machine