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Thirteen students of the Chennai-based Sri Venkateswara College of Engineering (SVCE) have won the silver medal in the ‘iGEM 2017’ competition. The iGEM is an international biotechnology competition held in Boston ever year; SVCE students have won an award at the competition for the third time in a row
In 2015, the first year SVCE participated, the students won a bronze; in the following two years, they have won silvers, according to a press release from the college. “The team worked on the foundational advancement of synthetic biology by developing novel genetic circuits using temperature and pH-based regulatory parts,” said Prof M Sivanandham, a biotechnologist, who mentored the team.
‘Gene circuitry’ is an evolving body of knowledge, in which biology tries to learn from semi-conductor science. An electronic circuit with sensors picks up signals, while internal logic circuits determine a logical response to the signals picked up and actuators provide the desired result. Gene circuits have biological equivalents of these — biological sensors, genetic logic gates and cellular mechanisms for providing output. As a result, it is possible to engineer a genetic circuit to, say, repair a damaged part of the body — synthetic biology. This was the area in which students of SVCE won Silver at Boston.
Elaborating on their work, Dr Nalinkanth Ghone, Primary Investigator of the team and professor of biotechnology and chemical engineering at SVCE, explains that the application of genetic circuits provides a two-way switch for microbes to synthesise particular proteins. “The pH (a measure of acidity) and temperature can act as input regulator for that switch. For example, at low pH values one type of proteins, and for higher pH values another type of protein will be produced.”
Prof Sivanandham, who is also the Secretary of the Sri Venkateswara Educational and Health Trust, which runs SVCE, said the college encourages and supports students financially in various co-curricular activities for generating innovative ideas and also promotes transformation of such ideas to start-ups, by providing funding through SVCE’s ‘Enterpreneurship Promotion and Incubation Centre’.
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