Recently, the 4th International Biomolecular Design Competition (BIOMOD) was held at Harvard University in the United States. Team SeaSon, consisting of 9 undergraduatestudents in Ocean University of China (OUC) from College of Medicine and Pharmacy, College of Food Science and Engineering, College of Marine Life Science and College of Economics, participated in the competition standing for OUC and won gold prize. Professor Liang Xingguo, the leader of Nucleic acidchemistry and biological technology laboratory in College of Food Science and Engineering, worked with the team as the advisor. It was the first time for students in OUC joining this competition since it has established. They competed in the area of bio-molecular design with their peers from top universities around the world and gained a delightful score.
As one of the advanced biologycompetitions, BIOMOD, established by Wyss Institute at Harvard University in 2011, aims at building the cooleststuff using the molecules of life, attracts hundreds of students from famous universities all over the world. Autonomous robots, molecular computers, biology structures created with the building blocks of DNA, RNA and proteinsare popular in the competition. In 2014, a total of 30 teams with more than 300 students participated in the jamboree in Harvard University to spread their projects out by their websites, videos and live presentations.
The Team SeaSon, including Wu Guangqi (as the team leader), Yang Yanyan, Wang Yunxia, Wang Leijie from College of Medicine and Pharmacy, Su Ziran from College of Food Science and Engineering, Xu Yang, XieYunhan and Wei Jinxun from College of Marine Life Science, and Liu Zixia from College of Economics, was supported by Nucleic acid chemistry and biological technology laboratory. The academic leader of thislaboratory Liang Xingguo, one of the Young overseas high-level talentsintroduction plan finalist directed the team in person. Focusing on the topic “Fabrication of DNA Triad and Olympic Rings”, the students took the advantage of DNA self-assembly to fabricate a brand new single stranded DNA (ssDNA) threering structure with a yield of 90%. On the basis, they also built Olympic Ringsin nanoscale with ssDNA. These are important breakthroughs in DNA catenation.Established in the summer of 2013, the OUC team overcame the difficulties intopic selection, research, experiment, results analysis and English presentationwith the assistance of the advisor, postdoctor Wu Wei and postgraduate student Li Qi. Eventually, they exhibited the mettle of OUC on the stage of Harvard University. Their assiduous spirits of science has won the appreciation of over 30 judges in the competition.
The members of TeamSeaSon interacted with their competitors actively during the competition. As the university motto says “Ocean Embraces Streams All, Exploring PromisesReaching Far”. They absorbed the advantages of others and showed their ownglamour. A great honor was won by Team SeaSon as a birthday gift for the 90thanniversary of OUC.
