Team:Freiburg/HumanPractice/synbio

From 2013.igem.org

The SynBio-Day in Germany

On September 7th, german iGEM teams organized again the Synthetic Biology Day to inform nationwide about Synthetic Biology. Each team had planned a project on their own to attract a huge number of people and present iGEM and their project in their hometown at the same time.
The iGEM team Freiburg aimed not only to inform the population but also give our visitors the chance to take action in an experiment - just in the sense: Learning by doing!
Therefore, we presented an interesting mix of informational posters and a scientific experiment at the Kaiser-Joseph-Straße, which is the superhub of Freiburg's downtown and the busiest street as well.
For the scientific experiment we chose the DNA extraction from banana which is possible to be conducted by every age and needs only some homewares.
Many citizens felt attracted by our performance and after a few minutes many discussions about Synthetic Biology started. Here we met with people that had completely different opinions towards genetic engineering. Nevertheless, also the opponents of genetic engineering were interested in our project and wished us success.
Although our posters and discussions had fulfilled the purpose to enlighten the citizens of Freiburg about the topic Synthetic Biology, the most inspirational subject of the day still remained the DNA extraction.
To support our information and be kept in memory we also delivered flyers with some sweets. We in turn, won't forget all the marveled faces that appeared when the DNA came to light in our experiment.