Industry News

Tools of Tomorrow

2039: E. coli “Scatalog”

Through a new technological development, E. chromi, the next generation of detection of E. coli poisoning just may be color analyses of one’s “poop.” Not microscopic variations of brown, but vivid reds, yellows, greens, blues, and violets.

In a collaboration between designers and scientists in synthetic biology, Cambridge University undergraduates genetically engineering bacteria to secrete a variety of colored pigments, visible to the naked eye. They designed standardized sequences of DNA, known as BioBricks, and inserted them into E. coli bacteria.

Each BioBrick part contains genes selected from existing organisms spanning the living kingdoms, enabling the bacteria to produce a color. By combining these with other BioBricks, bacteria could be programmed to do useful things, such as indicate whether drinking water is safe by turning red if they sense a toxin.

The team termed its as-yet-hypothetical diagnostic tool (tentatively “slated” for the year 2039), the “Scatalog,” with the explanation, “Cheap, personalized disease monitoring now works from the inside out. Ingested as yoghurt, E. chromi colonize the gut. The bacteria keep watch for chemical markers of disease and can produce easy-to-read warning signals.”

The team designed a timeline proposing ways that the foundational technology could develop over the next century, including food additives, patenting issues, personalized medicine, terrorism and new types of weather—not all of which are desirable. Designed at both the genetic and the human scale, E. chromi has set a precedent for future collaborations between designers and scientists.
 

Student Inventions

In its second year, the FIRST Lego League Global Innovation challenged students to solve a food safety problem. Two first-place awards were given for: an Erasable Barcode to prevent the sale of meat stored at improper temperatures at grocery stores and a Smart Sticker to indicate whether or not food has been stored at the appropriate temperature.

FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) is a not-for-profit organization that inspires young people’s interest in science and technology. For this season’s challenge, teams in more than 60 countries explored a set of food safety missions and developed solutions to improve the safety of the world’s food supply. Teams submitted their ideas to an online portal; more than one million votes were cast by the public to help determine the four finalists.

The first place teams were awarded up to $250,000 in services and support from the Go-To-Market Sponsor, Edison Nation, to help bring their ideas to market. Both teams will be featured on PBS’ Everyday Edisons. Two runner-up teams were awarded $5,000 grants from the X PRIZE Foundation. Winners included:

First Place winners were Moderately Confused of Dublin, Ohio, for the Erasable Barcode, and S.I.S. Robotic Revolution of Shelton, Conn., for the Smart Sticker.

Runners-Up were MATobot of New York, N.Y., for the Smart Milk Pitcher, and Seven World Wonders of Yeruham, Israel, for the FreezeStick.
 

Listen to Chickens To Improve Production

Chickens can’t speak, but they can make themselves heard. Researchers now believe that avian clucking and squawking may be more than idle chatter. A collaborative project by the Georgia Institute of Technology and the University of Georgia is investigating whether the birds’ volubility can provide clues to how healthy and comfortable they are.

Chickens are vocal creatures and produce different types of vocalizations at different rates and loudness based on their circumstances.

So the team is working to identify and extract specific vocalization features that will bear out both anecdotal observations and scientific work. The researchers are performing stress-related experiments on small flocks, recording the birds’ reactions on audio and video, and analyzing the results.