Huddersfield student part of World Championship Team
The successful iGEM team in Boston. (Ralf is fifth from the left)
Mon, 18 Nov 2013 12:09:00 GMT
Congratulations to Final Year Huddersfield student Ralf Wenz who was part of a team of students from a consortium of North of England universities that won the "Best Human Practices" Award at iGEM (international competition for Genetically Engineered Machines), the world’s most prestigious synthetic biology competition.
Ralf, a Molecular & Cellular Biology student, was part of the team who took part in the iGEM World Championships, which were held at MIT in Boston, USA in November following the earlier rounds which took place over the summer.
The team won ‘Best Human Practices’ prize for their work on developing a biosynthetic version of palm oil, which could help preserve the rainforest and thereby save elements of biodiversity, including the orangutan. The team also won a Gold Medal at the European Finals of iGEM, held in Lyon, two weeks before they competed in Boston.
The team competed with 73 synthetic biology teams at the World Championships and their project drew particular praise for a vision in which synthetic biology and traditional farming complemented each other.
