Project 2.0

So it seems as if the calls with the experts have prompted both groups to readjust their project goals pretty dramatically. If I learned one thing, it's that I prefer talking to people over researching online. The experts were just so informative and helpful in such a short amount of time. I kind of wish we had gotten to talk to experts earlier, so that we could have picked a more appropriate chassis from the start, but I suppose there's value in exploring the waters on your own first and learning from your mistakes.

Looking back, I feel like we were trying to piece together a system that was logically sound but not necessarily the most intuitive. A lot of choices seemed arbitrary and involved compounds that we happened to stumble upon and seemed to work. After running through the design process once and talking to the experts, I'm starting to realize the value of drawing from the experience of others to obtain a better sense of what tools and parts are available and appropriate in the bio engineering world. 

I'm treating this next phase as our project version 2.0. Vibrio seems like a very viable chassis, and I'm ready to see what the cyanobacteria expert suggests. 

On another note, something that really excited me was the fact that the bacterial expert had been contacted by industry to create something very similar to our project. That means that our idea is viable and in demand! This project has me seriously considering pursuing something similar in a lab as a UROP - I think that if I could work on a project like this in a team and have some control in the direction of the project, I would be working on my dream UROP.