Night of Arts and Sciences

On the 1st of june the night of arts and sciences took place in Groningen. This event consists of a number of expositions, concerts and gatherings with the purpose of bringing novel art and innovative science to the general audience. At this event, the Der AA church in Groningen was renamed to the church of science. Synthetic biology received special attention in this church of science and we were approached to tell the audience about challenges, possibilities and applications of synthetic biology. In synthetic biology, iGEM plays a major role and two of Groningen’s iGEM projects were presented. These were the hydrophobic film project and our implant coating project. The event had a duration of 8 hours and during this time we talked to a very diverse public ranging from children to adults with the most various background. They all got an impression of synthetic biology. Overall, the subject was well received, people were often fascinated or even amazed by the possibilities synthetic biology has to offer (Figure 1 and 2).

Figure 1 Some visitors entertained in front of our installation, where you could observe silk under the microscope.

Figure 2 Our contribution to the Night of Arts and Science was mentioned on a local newspaper. "In the church people could get a taste of synthetic biology" (English translation).