@@ -85,7 +85,9 @@ Moreover, sustainable agriculture practices that improve soil health and reduce
On September 12th we hosted a **Virtual Sustainable Developement Symposium** in which we further explored the link between the SDGs, synthetic biology and iGEM. This was done in order to highlight the role of sustainable developement oriented values in the future of genetic engineering. In doing so we brought together multiple contributing members, specfically iGEM teams, iGEM Ambassadors and researchers to promote the UN's 17 SDGs. In doing this we had 30 attendees at the event as well as over 500 views through promotional and educational material about the symposium and the SDGs themselves.
The opening presentation was done by iGEM ambassadors **Rashik Chand** (Asia & Oceania) and **Kate Willis-Urena** (Latin America) who spoke on what the 17 SDGs are and their role in iGEM. From this presentation attendees were able to understand the history and significane of the catagory as well as get additonal tips from the speakers. The second presentation was done by **Dr. Erik Steen-Redeker** specifically on his years long research in PET degredation with engineered Escheria coli. In this students were able to gain perspective on how SDGs drive research outside of iGEM and understand it's nuanances. In this we were also able to deeper explore the relationship between SDGs, research and society as Dr. Redeker claimed that "People are usually when they hear the word GMO however in my experiences I find when I explain my research and how we want to use GMOs to help the environment, it changes their attitudes towards them." The third speaker presentation was done by members of the iGEM Aachen 2023 team, **Frederik Kauẞmann** and **Melissa Lausberg**, who were nominated for the Sustainable Development Impact prize in their year. From them teams were able to learn their strategy for keeping sustainabilty at the core of their project, Rarecycle, which focused on recycling E-Waste with a fungal material equipt with metal binding peptides. They broke their plan down into 5 steps; 1: Asking yourself clarifying questions, 2: Choosing the right SDGs, 3: Building with research, 4: Consulting partners and experts and 5: Implement, learn and repeat. This provided the iGEM teams with a step by step plan to approach their project with the right SDGs in mind and growing with them. Each presentation also had a Q&A session. All presentation slides can be found below for future teams to inform themselves with.
The final segment of the virtual symposium was the pitch session in feedback was provided by iGEM Ambassador for Europe and past judge **Yassin Somoue Chafik**. In total there were 5 pitching teams including, **iGEM KU Leuven, iGEM REC-Chennai, iGEM AFCM Egypt, iGEM Bolivia and iGEM MSP-Maastricht**. In this time all teams could focus on pitching their project as well as their relation to the SDGs to gain feedback on their approach before the Grand Jamboree and Wiki freeze.
