BostonU WL and HW Teams Win Gold at iGem Jamboree 2016

The Jamboree was a jam-packed event filled with research presentations, workshops, poster sessions, a career fair, and a social.

Teams were judged on a 20 minute oral presentation, a poster, a Wiki they developed, and questions that the judges could ask during the Jamboree. Of 305 total teams, there were:

• 112 Gold Medals

• 74 Silver Medals

• 79 Bronze Medals

• 56 Teams had 2 or more nominations/awards for special categories

Both BostonU teams won a Gold Medal and received several nominations for special prizes.

The Foundational Advance team was nominated for being the Best Foundational Advance Track team, alongside William and Mary (the 2015 iGEM Jamboree winner) and Imperial College London (the 2016 iGEM Jamboree winner). They were also nominated for the Best Basic Part award and Best Part Collection award for their biological part submissions to iGEM’s Registry of Standard Biological Parts.

The Hardware team was nominated for Best Applied Design and Best Software Tool.

Overall, the judges said the Foundational Advance team developed a “slick website” with “crystal-clear” explanations. One judge said that that their “system looks good enough to revolutionise the control of gene expression in mammalian cells.” The Hardware team received comments like “impressive accomplishments” and were told that they had performed “substantial work...to produce an amazing hardware/software package useful in synthetic biology and other applications.”

Both teams walked away filled with pride and smiles on their faces, knowing that their accomplishments had made substantial contributions to the field of synthetic biology. Collectively, they are grateful for all of the support they received throughout their journey to the Jamboree, especially their mentors.

Most of the members of both teams plan to continue working in research and development with several performing further work on their projects.