Team:Charlottesville RS

In Albemarle county, most of the waste water goes and is processed through the Moores Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP), which is managed by the Rivanna Water & Sewer Authority. Each year, the plant purchases 250,000 dollars worth of glycerin, which is then used as “food” for bacteria which degrade the other organic matter in the water.

The UVa iGEM team from 2008 created a part that, when added, enables E Coli to produce polyhydroxybutyrate, a biodegradable, bio-derived plastic. Our idea is to make a type of E Coli that produces this plastic, with a reporter which fluoresces when the bacteria is successfully producing.

The plant could then use this bacteria to create polyhydroxybutyrate, filter out the E Coli, and then use the plastic as an alternative food source for their bacteria, saving them 250,000 dollars per year, as well as giving them a renewable energy source for their plant.

News

29 Oct. 2008, Wiki-Freeze culminates into iGEM Ecolicence Song

To see our spontaneous iGEM Ecolicence composition click here

28 Oct. 2008, Generous Donation by Klaus Tschira Foundation

The Klaus Tschira Foundation gGmbH is a non-profit organization and supports research in informatics, the natural sciences, and mathematics; at the same time it promotes a public understanding in these sciences. With this combination the Klaus Tschira foundation is our ideal partner in this competition.

22 Oct. 2008, New Sponsor: Graffinity

Again, we are very happy to announce a new sponsor: Graffinity. Graffinity is a company working on fragment based drug discovery and the development of small molecule pharmaceuticals. Graffinity is located in the Heidelberg Technology Park, the great cooperation location on the Heidelberg Campus, where national research centers and international companies work hand in hand. We are proud to have Graffinity as a great partner with us.

13 Oct. 2008, New leading Sponsor: DKFZ

www.dkfz.de/en

We are proud to announce the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), Heidelberg as the new leading sponsor of our iGEM team. As Harald zur Hausen, former chair of DKFZ, was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine last week, we are very happy to have the DKFZ as a strong partner of our team.

08 Oct. 2008, New Sponsor: Leica Microsystems GmbH

Leica Microsystems GmbH (Wetzlar, Germany) is a leading global designer and manufacturer of precise optical systems for the analysis of microstructures; we are proud to have Leica as a Bronze partner with us!

07 Oct. 2008, FAZ Reports on Heidelberg Team

Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung has printed a short report on the Heidelberg iGEM team. You can read the article titled "Krieg im Brutkasten der Biotechnik" here.

06 Oct. 2008, Medicine Nobel Prize goes to DKFZ Heidelberg

Harald zur Hausen (DKFZ Heidelberg) is awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine for the discovery of the cancerous Papilloma virus, which envisions today a vaccination against infection. He shares the prize with Francoise Barre-Sinoussi and Luc Montagnier (both Institut Curie, Paris) for their discovery of the HIV. Harald zur Hausen has been chair of the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) here in Heidelberg from 1983 to 2003 and lead the institute to its world wide reputation. The Heidelberg iGEM team congratulates him to this historic honor!!

17 Sep. 2008, Podcast on iGEM project

[http://www.uni-heidelberg.de/presse/news08/pm280917-1eil.mp3 Podcast]

While the Heidelberg project is progressing rapidly, the team enjoys more PR. In this podcast of the Ruperto-Carola University Professor Eils explains the Heidelberg project in the context of Synthetic Biology to the public.

17 Sep. 2008, iGEM Heidelberg goes public with Prometheus TV

Today the Heidelberg team welcomed Prometheus TV - a modern and Internet based broadcaster on science - to communicate synthetic biology and explain its work to the public. The broadcasting date will be soon posted here.

02 Sep. 2008, Geneart becomes Silver Sponsor

Geneart AG (Regensburg, Germany) - one of the main iGEM sponsors - will synthesize genes for our iGEM team . Geneart is one of the most innovative and world-leading companies in gene synthesis and directed evolution. For this support we position Geneart as our second Silver sponsor.

29 Aug. 2008, Beckman Coulter is Platinum Sponsor

The iGEM team is proud to announce that Beckman Coulter, Inc. - the world-leading manufacturer of innovative and automated biomedical instruments - will be our Platinum partner in this year's competition. The California based company connects medical research and clinical trials with laboratory diagnostics and enhances with 200,000 installed systems health care around the world. We are sure this partnership will turn out to be a crucial benefit for the ultimate Championship Jamboree at MIT.

29 Aug. 2008, iGEM Heidelberg goes public with FAZ and Campus TV

On Friday 29th of august we had a visit of journalists from each Campus TV and from the FAZ (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung). We had a great time gaining first experience as "TV stars". There will soon be reports of our team and our project in the media. Links to this will be published here.

14 Aug. 2008, Lange+Pflanz becomes Gold Sponsor

Lange & Pflanz Werbeagentur GmbH (www.lpsp.de) have just declared the sponsorship of our team by designing a team logo, a team shirt, a website, and power-point slides for the Championship Jamboree at MIT. This positions the company - an established marketing and design company which successfully designed the website for our Bioquant Institute - right into the sponsorship Gold category. The first results for the team logo you will find soon on this page!

Sponsors