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Team:Macquarie Australia/Openday
From 2013.igem.org
Macquarie University Open Day
The Open Day for Macquarie University was held on the 14th September this year, and every year attracts a wide range of people, from prospective students to families with young children. For this reason we planned a range of activities in the labs for people to look at and also some hands on activities to excites the children but also educational for the parents and future students. For this day, the whole team got involved in planning and participating
Chlorophyll Chromatography
Why do leaves change colour? Through chlorophyll chromatography we answered this question. This hands on activity allowed people to perform a chromatography to observe the different pigments within leaves to show why leaves change colour. Further we also had team members on hand to explain this and provide the link with our project.
Photosynthesis
Like the chromatograph activity, a photosynthesis display was also set up the show part of the process. This display involved placing seaweed in a sealed test tube full of water, to show photosynthesis in action through the production of bubbles in the tube. Once again this provided a link to our project that was easy to explain to the general public.
Glowing Plates
For the day we set up glowing plates, using fluorescent E. coli made using parts obtained from the registry. These plates provided an exciting and visual display for people to look at to show the simplicity created from the open source nature of synthetic biology.
Plate 1: 17B (BBa_K864100)- Super Yellow Flurescent Protein
19I (BBa_K592100)- Blue Flurescent Protein
Plate 2: 2B (BBa_J63009)- Red Flurescent Protein- control
Plate 3: 5H (BBa_I13521- Red Flurescent Protein
5J (BBa_I13522)- Green Flurescent Protein
20C (BBa_I13600- Cyan Flurescent Protein
Gibson Assembly Puzzle
We also set up a Gibson assembly puzzle along with a DNA model. We had team members present to help explain the process of these techniques and the advantages they provide us.
Magic Milk
However the hit of the day was definitely the magic milk practical, where people were able to added different colour food dye to full cream milk, using micropipettes, the addition of detergent then provided the magic that entertained both the children and adults.
