Development of international genetically engineered machine competition in China

Abstract:

Synthetic biology is a fast moving interdisciplinary branch of biology and engineering. To educate the next generation of synthetic biology scientists, the International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition was established. In the past eleven years, many Chinese teams have participated in this event, but no thorough review and analysis have been carried out. In this paper, we collected the data and information of the Chinese teams from the iGEM website and analyzed the number, distribution and performance of Chinese teams in iGEM competition. We also described contributions made by the Conference of China iGEMer Community (CCiC) organization. The contributions to China higher education made by the iGEM competition were also summarized. Finally, we proposed several suggestions for the development of the iGEM competition in China. We envision the iGEM competition will continue to promote the innovative education and cultivation of the next-generation synthetic biology scientists in China.