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Duke iGEM 2014 team with faculty advisors Nick Buchler, front left, and Charlie Gersbach, front right. Mike is behind Dr. Gersbach.

by Anika Radiya-Dixit

The International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition is dedicated to education for students interested in the advancement of synthetic biology, in other words, taking engineering principles and applying them to natural sciences like biology.

Students in the competition explored using a gene or series of genes from E.coli bacteria to create biological devices for applications such as dissolving plastic or filtering water. In November 2014, the Duke iGEM team took part in the annual competition in Boston, proudly leaving with a gold medal on their work in 3D printing technology and DNA synthesis protocol.

This week, I contacted the iGEM team and had the opportunity to talk with one of the members, Mike Zhu, about his experience in the competition. Mike is currently a junior from Northern California studying Biomedical Engineering and Computer Science. He is enthusiastic about researching how biology and computer science interact, and is conducting research with Dr. John Reif on DNA technology. Mike is also involved with the Chinese Dance team, and enjoys cooking, eating, and sleeping. Below is an edited transcript of the interview.

 

How did you get interested in your project topic?

We wanted to build a binary response platform that uses logic gates or on-off switches in E. coli to make it easier to regulate genes. We used the CRISPr/Cas9 system that allows for specific targeting of any gene, and that enables synthetic biologists to create more complex gene circuits. Personally, I was interested in developing an infrastructure that allows engineering concepts to be applied to cells, such as creating code that allows cells to do arithmetic so they can keep track of the cells around them. I think applications like these open doors to a really cool field.

 

What was your best moment during the Boston competition?

The competition was four days long, but we had to come back early due to work and midterms, so we missed the last dance and dinner, but overall it was a lot of fun. There were multiple workshops and talks, and the one that stood out most to me was one by someone from MIT who designed a ‘biocompiler’ to take code specifying the behavior of cells [1]. It was essentially like creating a programming language for cells, and I thought that was really cool.

Tell me about someone interesting you met.

There were a lot of people from the industry who came by and asked about our project, and some of them wanted to recruit us for internships. At the competition, there were people from all over the world, and I liked best that they were friendly and genuinely interested in developing tools to work with cells.

 

Experiment work in a biology lab.

What was the hardest or most frustrating part of working on the project?

Lab work is always the most frustrating because you’re dealing with microscopic parts – things easily go wrong and it’s difficult to debug, so we ended up repeating the experiments over and over to work through it.

 Are you continuing with  the competition this year?

I’m working for Caribou Biosciences in Berkeley, one of the companies that wanted to recruit us during the competition. They are developing tech similar to what we did, so I enjoy that.

It’s a good thing to get into bioengineering. People are trying to make  tech cheaper and easier so we can potentially do experiments in our garage – sort of like ‘biohacking’ or do-it-yourself-biology – and this still has a long way to go, but it’s really cool.

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Mike Zhu, wearing the competition shirt.

Now that you’ve gone through the competition, what would you like to say to future students who are interested in applying their knowledge of BME  learned at Duke?

There are a lot of clubs at Duke that are project-based, but these are primarily in Electrical Engineering or Mechanical Engineering, so the iGEM competition is – as far as I know – the only project-based club for students more interested in biology. You get funding, lab space, and mentors with a team of undergraduates who can work on a project themselves. It’s pretty rare for both PIs [Principal Investigators] to give the undergrads free reign to work on what they want, especially compared to volunteering in a lab. You also get a chance to present your project and meet up with other people, and you’re exposed to topics most students get to experience only in senior year classes. Overall, the club is a great way to be introduced to cutting edge research, and it’s a good opportunity for freshman to find out what’s going on in BME.

Learn More about the Duke iGEM team and project

[1] More about MIT’s Biocomplier can be read at http://web.mit.edu/jakebeal/www/Talks/IBE12-BioCompiler-Feedback-abstract.txt.