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Course Orientation and Objectives

+ SynBio Recap from Past Courses

SynBio4ALL Africa Plant Course

Week 0 [ Optional]

Presented by Ice Cholpisit Kiattiswee

May 28th , 2025

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Week 0 Schedule

  • Background of SynBio4ALL Africa and the Course (20 min)

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  • Navigating Available Resources (10 min)

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  • Reviewing Synthetic Biology and a bit about Plants (15 min)

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Navigating our Mission | SynBio4ALL Africa

Check our website

https://synbio4all.wixsite.com/synbio4all

We bring [bio]diverse activities to the African community

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Why are we introducing Plant SynBio Now?

The interests in Plant SynBio last year fueled our mission

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Microgrant from Experiment Foundation

https://experiment.com/plantsynbio4all

A video description on our YouTube channel!!!

We are committed to

  • Make this course open-source
  • Identify Plant for Whole-genome sequencing
  • Initiate lab work locally

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Plant SynBio �Instructor Team�and Schedule

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plus more volunteers~~~

Accessible Education designed for low-resource community

Participants outside of Africa are welcome to join

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SynBio4ALL Africa

Monthly Webinar | plantae

Prof. Cătălin Voiniciuc,

Horticultural Sciences, University of Florida

Introduction to Plant SynBio and Automation

Through the Lens of Cell Wall Bioengineering

June 6th, 2025, on 7 pm Eastern Africa Time (4 pm UTC)

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Joining our community

Instruction is provided in this email

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Accept Group Invitation for this Course

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We have invited all registrants to date to the Google Group, �unless your email is incompatible.

Click “Accept this invitation” to join

We will email you zoom links and reminder ~3-day and 1-day before the scheduled class.

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How to Participate in this Course

Certificate of Course Completion will be granted for those who:

  • Attend lectures: Through zoom or watch the recordings
    • Check Syllabus for Slide Presentations, Recordings, and Homework
    • Note that Class recordings will be available to course takers only during the class and will be shared publicly at the end of August
  • Submit Homework: Through Google Forms
    • Homework is due before next class
    • The form might be long but only 5 points (out of ~15) is needed to pass
  • Participate in the Group Project
    • Work together to identify the African Native Plants for biodiversity study

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Available Resources

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Beginner’s Course 2023

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Beginner’s Course 2023

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6 Classes are available with content ranging from a simple concept to technical overview

from

Syllabus

Recording

Slides

Homework

and

are publicly available

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Microbial Course 2024

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Microbial Course 2024

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7 Classes based on

parts/systems Engineering

Materials are publicly available

Group project proposal as exercise

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Synthetic Biology�Recap

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Central Dogma of Molecular Biology�and How to Control Them (or Synthesize?)

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Storage

Message

Function

Green

Fluorescent

Protein

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Solving Global Challenges with SynBio

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Karim, A. et al 2024 Nature Communications

Insulin

Artemisinin

Pork Liver

to Bacteria

Herbs

to Yeast

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Most biological data are stored in DNA

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Storage

Message

Function

Plasmid

DNA

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DNA as Parts in�Synthetic Biology

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Lee et al. ACS Synth. Biol. 2015, 4, 9, 975–986

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Precise Engineering at DNA Level

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Figures adapted from CRISPRpedia | Innovative Genomics Institute

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Precise Engineering at DNA Level

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Figures adapted from CRISPRpedia | Innovative Genomics Institute

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Precise Engineering at DNA Level

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Figures adapted from CRISPRpedia | Innovative Genomics Institute

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DNA as information storage in Organisms

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Storage

Message

Function

And biological organisms are very DIVERSE!!!

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Sizes of Different Biological Entities: Cells

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Cell Biology by the Numbers

Some cells are visible to human eyes.

Large amount off cells form complex organisms

🡪 Animal and Plants

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Sizes of Different Biological Entities: Genome

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Cell Biology by the Numbers

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Multiple Microbes 🡪 Microbiome

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Images from NIH, Ma et al. 2023 and EMBL News

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CDS

Promoter

Terminator

Tag

Reporter

Cleave

Inteins

TEV

SUMO

5

Chromoproteins

Fluorescent proteins

Enzymatic

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​

His

Silica

Cellulose

10

​

​

Polymerases

Ligases

Reverse Transcriptases

>60

Open Enzyme Collection

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Designed by

Synthesised by

& many collaborators!

Distributed under

Funded by

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Alternative feedstocks for bioproduction

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Hernandez-Beltran et al., 2019

https://doi.org/10.3390/app9183721

Domestication of thermophyles

Expand substrate acceptance in yeast

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How to Participate in this Course

Certificate of Course Completion will be granted for those who:

  • Attend lectures: Through zoom or watch the recordings
    • Check Syllabus for Slide Presentations, Recordings, and Homework
    • Note that Class recordings will be available to course takers only during the class and will be shared publicly at the end of August
  • Submit Homework: Through Google Forms
    • Homework is due before next class
    • The form might be long but only 5 points (out of ~15) is needed to pass
  • Participate in the Group Project
    • Work together to identify the African Native Plants for biodiversity study

Optional Homework will be available at the end of the week