20th Year of iGEM!

As iGEM 2023, the 20th year of iGEM, comes to a close, all of us at iGEM HQ wish to express our appreciation for the many people who have dedicated their time, talent, work, and support in building a strong and vibrant synthetic biology research community and industry, and creating synthetic biology ecosystems around the world.

Tomorrow (November 2), the doors to the Paris Expo Porte de Versailles will open to celebrate the 20th year of iGEM at the 2023 Grand Jamboree! This year, the Grand Jamboree has expanded to include a multitude of presentations, panel discussions, workshops, and satellite events designed to bring together all facets of the growing field of synthetic biology.

Software plays a transformative role in driving advances in synthetic biology. From designing biological systems and automating lab equipment, to managing collaborations and analyzing vast amounts of data, software underpins many of the essential tasks in making biology easier to engineer.

The iGEM team wiki is the primary means by which teams communicate their entire project to the world. The wiki is essentially a website that provides background information, describes project goals, and shows experimental results. Like other forms of scientific publication, the wiki also includes references to acknowledge the work of previous iGEM teams and other research groups that have helped inform the current project. Importantly, the team wiki has been a key deliverable since iGEM first became an international competition in 2005, and is archived so it can be accessed by future teams and iGEM community members.

This year marks the 20th anniversary of iGEM, a non-profit organization dedicated to education of the next generation of researchers and entrepreneurs in the field of synthetic biology. This year also marks the 10th anniversary of IDT being a platinum sponsor of one of the most prestigious and sought-after synthetic biology (synbio) competitions in the world. To commemorate these two anniversaries, let’s take a look back on how iGEM began and how IDT is supporting the future leaders of synthetic biology.

While all iGEM teams push the boundaries of synthetic biology, teams who undertake plant projects must overcome a challenge that is particular to plants – namely, that plants take a long time to grow. One reason iGEM teams are successful in pioneering plant synthetic biology is because the teams that have come before have expended effort to get plants to grow within the timeframe of an iGEM Competition season. In honor of the 20th year of iGEM, we thought we’d take a look back on the achievements of some of the teams that have pioneered plant synthetic biology.

Hardware, Software, Wetware – all are encompassed within the Design-Build-Test-Learn cycle of synthetic biology. In honor of 20 years of iGEM, we’d like to feature the Hardware developed by iGEM teams.

Synthetic biology holds tremendous promise for addressing global challenges, but like all powerful technologies, there also are risks of accidental or deliberate misuse that could cause harm. In honor of the 20th year of iGEM, I’d like to take a look back on some of the highlights of iGEM’s history in building a strong culture of responsibility for biosafety and biosecurity.

Twenty years ago, scientists were using an ad hoc approach to assemble genetic constructs, which required a lot of time and did not always work as anticipated. Tom Knight, an engineer by training, thought that applying standard engineering mechanisms could make the assembly of genetic constructs more reliable. And so, in 2003, Tom proposed an assembly method for standard biological parts, or “BioBricks”.

In the first post on “What is iGEM?” I asked you, the readers of the iGEM blog, to share what iGEM means to you. One of the common themes in the responses received so far is: iGEM is the pioneering organization of synthetic biology.

DNA Day (April 25) is just around the corner. As you can imagine, DNA is a rather big deal at iGEM. In just a few short weeks, the 2023 iGEM Distribution kit - containing thousands of physical DNA parts - will be sent in the mail to teams all around the world. Take a moment to consider what it means to have a curated collection of DNA parts from iGEM’s entire 20-year history arriving in your mailbox!

Everyone in our community is working towards iGEM’s purpose to “make sure that the field of synthetic biology, and all of the power that this technology holds, gets developed everywhere by everyone”. At the 2022 Grand Jamboree, one of the Keynotes focused on iGEM’s purpose through a moderated discussion with panelists from four different regions of the world.

It’s been a while since I’ve reflected on the meaning of iGEM. When I first joined the iGEM Foundation, I asked you, the readers of the iGEM blog: “What does iGEM mean to you?” In compiling the responses, I learned that iGEM means many things to many people.

There have been many definitions of synthetic biology over the years, but I especially like the definition offered by my friend and colleague, Megan Palmer: “Synthetic biology is a community, a field, and an approach”. I find her definition quite telling because it shows just how unique what we are doing at iGEM actually is.

Celebration is integral to the iGEM journey. Being happy and grateful for the milestones reached can help us through the challenges and difficult times we may face in forging a better future with synthetic biology.

Since beginning in 2003, iGEM has inspired thousands of students to build a better world by using synthetic biology to solve local problems and tackle global challenges. Now as leaders in academia, government and industry in over 45 countries, iGEMers are significantly advancing synthetic biology and contributing to society.

The iGEM community is a wonderfully diverse group of people from all over the world who are passionate about developing and applying the tools of synthetic biology to address the challenges facing our world today.

Here we are in the future, and iGEM 2021 promises to be bright as ever. This year, we will again embrace the 4 C’s of iGEM – Competition, Community, Contribution and Celebration – as we welcome returning and new iGEMers to the 2021 season.

As the eve of the 2019 Giant Jamboree approaches, it’s a good time to reflect on the continued evolution of the International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) Foundation.

If you have been following iGEM for a while, you’ve probably already heard about Ginkgo Bioworks,…

Local people solving local problems all around the world

The first in a series of posts reflecting on the meaning of iGEM

A conversation with Tom Knight on his Synthetic Biology journey at MIT, iGEM and Ginkgo Bioworks