This blog is where we share stories, announcements, and insights from around the iGEM community.
Meet Manuel Rozas, an emblematic figure in Chile's scientific innovation ecosystem. As the founder of Kura Biotech, he has positioned his company as one of the pioneers in biotechnological enzyme production in Latin America, transforming his passion for science into a global enterprise that sells to the world's leading toxicology laboratories.
This article is a part of a series of three articles that explore how science is communicated through popular media such as animation, television and film, using engaging storytelling.
Ruchika Tekethotil, iGEM Promoter for Asia & Oceania, began her journey with the iGEM Community after hearing inspiring stories from her university seniors, Sabyasachi Banerjee and Onkar Date, who had been a part of different iGEM Programs.
A total of 45 teams participated in the Venture Foundry Program, alongside 25 teams in the 2025 Fast-Track Program and 24 kiosks showcased at the BioInnovation Fair. This year marked a milestone for our Startup Showcase, featuring a cohort rich in innovation and global talent. Many teams have already filed or are in the process of filing patents. A total of over $200K in funding has been secured. Teams represented regions from across the world.
For Damian Ungureanu, iGEM was more than a competition, it was a turning point. From working on conductive protein nanowires to rethinking his career path, Damian reflects on his journey, the value of interdisciplinary teams, and why Romania’s next generation should embrace synthetic biology.
Every year, iGEM startups is dedicated to supporting aspiring BioFounders to explore entrepreneurship, and bridge the gap between ideas and impact within synthetic biology projects. Through the Venture Foundry program, our aim is to engage with scientists and introduce concepts of entrepreneurship and commercialisation in a research-driven context.
One of the standout startups in this year’s VCL 2025 Cohort comes from TU Munich (Technical University of Munich): Lucas Mair and Magdalena Lang, two medical school students who are using Artificial Intelligence (AI) to tackle one of the industry’s biggest pain points: inefficient lab workflows. Through their startup, Provigen.AI, they’re not only streamlining experimental processes, but also showing how the next generation of student biofounders is thinking, building, and scaling a biotech startup.
My name is Shumvobi Mitra and I am currently both a high school student and the founder of RhizeUP, a startup based in Maryland in the United States. I first got involved with iGEM in 2023 with the iGEM Team East Coast BioCrew. What started as a competition project has now grown into RhizeUP, a startup tackling fertilizer runoff and supporting sustainable agriculture.
Every year, the iGEM Startups Summer School brings together iGEM teams from across the globe for two days of workshops, panel discussions, case studies and networking. This year, we were joined by 251 participants belonging to 110 iGEM teams (Figure 1).
This was a great opportunity for aspiring 2025 iGEM teams to explore their entrepreneurial potential and the possibility of winning the Best Entrepreneurship Prize at the iGEM Competition!
Meet Shumvobi Mitra, a high school founder of RhizeUP based in Maryland, in the United States. She began her journey with iGEM Team East Coast BioCrew 2023, engineering rhizobia bacteria to combat fertilizer runoff and protect waterways. After the iGEM Competition, she joined the 2024 iGEM Startups Venture Foundry Program to officially launch RhizeUP.
For many iGEMers, the competition is more than just a project showcase, it’s a launchpad to the next step in their synthetic biology journey. The people you meet, the roles you take on and the networks you build can take you into the many corners of the field, including the startup ecosystem.
At the 2024 iGEM Grand Jamboree, we caught up with Adrian Romberg, formerly working in Product Management at xyna.bio, a startup based in Mainz, Germany, focused on making powerful computation tools and bioinformatics intuitive and accessible.
Tudor Onose’s journey into synthetic biology began with iGEM. As a team member in 2020 and 2021, and later as a mentor to the 2024 Warwick team, he’s seen the competition from two sides. Now a Ph.D. student at the University of Warwick, Tudor studies bacterial electrophysiology, and reflects in this interview with Andreea Cernei about team-building, mentorship and the future of synbio in Romania.
Explore how iGEM and youth-led initiatives are bridging the gap between lab work and public understanding, via storytelling, engagement and ethics in the latest SciComm Made Easy Blog.
To understand the thought process behind the creation of the BioInnovation Summit, a new event for 2025 at the iGEM Grand Jamboree, we spoke with Nemanja Stijepovic (President of the iGEM Foundation), Dorothy Zhang (Executive Vice President of iGEM) and Nadine Bongaerts (iGEM alumna, and curator of the BioInnovation Summit).
Explore how SciComm is reshaping the relationship between science and society, from open-access platforms and citizen science, to inclusive storytelling and the risks of the digital age.
The 2025 Venture Creation Lab (VCL), held from April 21st to May 16th, hosted by iGEM Startups, brought together aspiring biotech entrepreneurs from around the world to take their first concrete steps toward building a synthetic biology startup. Following the momentum of the BioHackathon, the VCL provided a four-week program designed to turn early ideas into viable venture concepts through lectures, workshops and personalized mentorship.
What does it take to build a synthetic biology ecosystem in a region with limited infrastructure? For Benjamin Arias, it starts with community and a commitment to open science. Benjamin Arias shares how he’s building grassroots biotech tools and creating space for students, educators and researchers in Ecuador
Can design bridge the gap between science and society? Synthetic biology is full of promise, but also complexity, confusion and misinformation. Effective science communication can make a difference and visual aesthetics play a powerful role.
Jonty Corrin started his career in academia as a bioscientist, but his entrepreneurial journey began during his final year of undergraduate work. While his first startup didn’t thrive, it sparked a passion for early-stage startups and their growth. Along the way, he connected with Nucleate UK, a student-led, nonprofit organization that helps early-stage biotech founders translate academic research into real-world startups with dynamic support.
AI is streamlining data analysis, optimizing experiments, and even assisting in literature reviews. But as its role grows, so do ethical concerns: Who takes credit for AI-generated discoveries? Can we trust AI-driven research without human oversight?
