Students on the UC Santa Cruz International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) team, now in its 11th iteration, have a legacy of taking on community-focused projects — and this year was no different.
The student team spent a year working to address the high cost of infant formula, an issue that touched members of the group personally, and affects families around the world. They recently presented their project at iGEM Jamboree in Paris, a worldwide synthetic biology competition, where they received a silver medal for their work. Along the way, the team took a deep dive into infant formula inaccessibility, foundational approaches for genetically modifying challenging organisms, and how to work together as a team through both obstacles and successes.
“We really wanted to hone in on community focus,” said Clare Reyes, a biomolecular engineering (BME) student and co-captain of the 2024 team. “UCSC projects always have a direct impact. Helping people out is what we want to do, and that’s the goal we were chasing with the infant formula project. We came up with a bridge between the two — having communities in focus, but making the science do the work.”
Addressing formula inaccessibility
The UC Santa Cruz iGEM team is made up of 16 undergraduate students from several science and engineering majors, led by team co-captains Reyes and Monisha Pillai, and advised by Associate Teaching Professor of BME David Bernick. The team spends a quarter researching project ideas, a summer in the lab developing their solution, and most of a quarter preparing to present at the international jamboree.
After spending a few months researching potential project ideas, the team landed on the challenge of making infant formula more affordable, noting shortages that arose during the pandemic and personal stories of how team members’ families had been affected by this issue.
“I think the ethos behind our project was that so many of our team members had younger sibling and families affected, and we just wanted to find a way we could address women who are having trouble lactating, and socioeconomic inaccessibility for formula — especially considering so many Americans are uninsured,” Reyes said.
The team planned to tackle this issue head-on, attempting to address the manufacturing costs of infant formula by developing a nutrient-rich formula base that would reduce the need for costly additives. The plan was to do this by using spirulina, a nutrient-rich compound that provides all the amino acids needed for development, as a new base for formula. They hoped to genetically modify cyanobacteria, the living organism that dries to become spirulina, to add in a gene that would enable it to produce a sugar-lactose compound found in breastmilk.
A foundational approach
However, with the guidance of Professor Bernick, they learned that cyanobacteria is one of the most difficult organisms to genetically modify. They decided to turn their focus to improving methods to add genes to cyanobacteria, so that their original goal might be reached in the long term.
Cyanobacteria is hard to modify because it contains many copies of its genome, so a gene that gets added to just one copy of the genome can be quickly wiped out as the organism makes copies of the un-edited ones. The team’s solution, called Limnospira inspired Foundational Technology (LiFT), aims to accelerate the rate at which a new gene can be inserted into cyanobacteria.
The team presented an update on their project at the Jamboree, and much of the team will continue to work on their system throughout the rest of the academic year, with hopes of publishing a research paper on their discoveries.
iGEM community
Throughout the research process, the team integrated “human practice” by meeting and collaborating with a wide range of people, from those affected by infant formula inaccessibility to cyanobacteria engineering experts. They strove to make sure their work was reflective of the values that inspired the project, responsive to community feedback, and responsible as it pertains to safety, ethics, and impact.
Their time at the Jamboree reflected these goals, and the team got to meet students from around the world who are striving to mitigate the pressing issues of the modern world, such as the climate crisis.
“It was really uplifting to see other young people who care so much about the future, and about being responsible about bioengineering,” Reyes said. “You see other people who are as passionate as you, but their passion is about something completely different, so you get to learn so much.”
Back at UCSC, both Reyes and Pillai had long looked up to the projects and community of the iGEM teams that came before them. Reyes had heard about iGEM before even arriving at UC Santa Cruz, with the program drawing her to the BME major, and joined early as an intern for the 2023 team. Pillai stayed dedicated to the team even as she aimed to complete the challenging biomolecular engineering degree in three years.
“I’ve always wanted to be on the iGEM team – it’s been like a dream come true,” Pillai said.
As team captains, Reyes and Pillai were tasked with keeping the energy high, even as the team encountered challenges along the way and worked long hours in the lab over the summer. The co-captains also were able to lean on advice from past UCSC iGEM teams, as the program has created a strong alumni network over the years.
“It was hard at times, because we weren’t getting tangible results,” Pillai said. “It felt like every time we did make a bit of progress, at least initially, we'd find something that maybe was a technical error or something that isn't exactly proving what we wanted it to. But I think what was amazing was that our team really gets along with one another, and I’m proud of where we ended up.”
“The summer was a crash course in learning how to collaborate, because our team really got along and that was great, but when things got tough, it was really more important for us to show how we respected each other by communicating and giving space for people,” Reyes said.
The full 2024 UCSC iGEM team includes: Cesar Duarte, Joseph Garcia, Daniel Yankin, Vibhitha Nandakumar, Kayla Kennamore, Clare Reyes, Aurko Mahesh, Neely Pfieffer, Emmet Benaryeh, Jacob Bautista, Kendra Krueger, Monisha Pillai, Nivriti Bopparaju, Marshall Sekula, Brenda Lai, and Zaden Yet.
