The International Genetically Engineered Machine competition (iGEM) was held at MIT this past week. For the first time in Georgia Tech history, a team from GT was represented in the iGEM competition.  The team was led by Eric Gaucher (advisor), an associate professor in Biology; Mark Stycynzski, an assistant professor from Chemcial and Biomolecular Engineering; Joshua Weitz, assistant professor of Biology and Physics; and Richard Joh, a physics graduate student. The team comprised of several undegrads from COE and COS competed against some 130 other teams from the U.S, Latin America, Europe, Canada, and Asia.

The GT team has been working on a project designed to “synthetically engineer heat-producing bacterial cells in response to exposure to cold environments” since the spring of 2010. The team is observing different organisms’ methods of producing heat and has found a viable candidate in the AOX gene that many plants use for thermogenesis.

Weitz says. “The iGEM team embodies Georgia Tech’s commitment to undergraduate research and highlights the importance of biology in shaping research and technological challenges faced by both engineers and scientists.”

The iGEM competition was founded in January of 2003 and is considered the premier undergrad biology competition. The GT team has 13 undergrads from the College of Engineering and the College of Sciences - Mitesh Agrawal, Margo Clark, Robert Fee, Christina Graves, Atta Hassan, Scott Holmes, Monica Huynh, Gita Mahmoudabadi, Christian Mandrycky, Debika Mitra, Amy Schwartz, Shadeah Suleiman and Siddharth Tantia.