Innovation Anthology #414:
Alberta university students are already gearing up for the 2011 International Genetically Engineered Machines Competition in Boston.
Justin Vyger is a 4th year biochemistry student at the University of Lethbridge.
Last year his iGEM team won gold for a little organism they created that degrade a toxic chemical in oil sands tailings ponds.
This year the University of Lethbridge team is taking that process once step further.
JUSTIN VYGER: What we focused on last year is there’s one chemical compound that other toxic compounds can be degraded into. So we decided if we could get that one chemical degraded by an organism and get that working, we might be able to target the other compounds. So now what we’re doing is focusing on those compounds that we first started out to degrade. So your polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, or PAH’s which are very tough to degrade, they’re very toxic. We’ve got some cool organisms we’re working with and we’re mix and matching pieces from them and putting them into our engineered organism from last year.
Justin Vyger and his iGEM team are also producing a movie that will accompany their submission to the iGEM competiton in Boston.
Thanks today to Alberta Innovates Technology Futures
FOR INNOVATION ANTHOLOGY
I’M CHERYL CROUCHER
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Alberta Innovates Technology Futures
Alberta Innovates launched its consolidation on November 1, 2016
780-450-5111
albertatechfutures.ca
250 Karl Clark Road,
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
T6N 1E4
Program Date: 2011-08-04