Some of Us Haven’t Even Met -MSP iGEM

Shrilaxmi
Humans of iGEM
Published in
3 min readAug 13, 2020
MSP iGEM 2020.

Meet MSP iGEM 2020, a team that is close-knit despite their circumstances. Their team was formed very shortly before the eruption of the pandemic so for them, the lockdown meant not only staying at home but also working with a team that had never met in full offline.

“We met for the first time shortly before corona, but the lockdown had started so people were not able to come because we’re a very international team. We just had that first meeting and after that, it was only online meetings.” -Larissa.

In situations like these, it is always the little things that bring people together. They all agree that working on making the YouTube videos for their channel Geneducation has been a major bonding experience.

“When our team was making YouTube videos for the channel, one of our team members said ‘I feel like I’ve met you already’ just because he had to edit out all my laughs because I laugh a lot while filming.” -Juliette.

But things are definitely looking up. With the official lockdown over, the team has started getting together in small groups to hang out offline. Still, being a team spread across countries does afford a challenge in this respect.

“We get to know each other via text and zoom. The bonds are maybe not as strong as they would be if we physically met, but we do get to know each other a little bit.” -Larissa.

The mode of interaction isn’t the only thing that quarantine has changed. This team is always looking at the positive side of things like the fact that there is just so much more accessibility in terms of meetups, international human practices contacts, and online resources for iGEM.

Being a second-time team has certainly had an effect on how the team is run this year. Although they haven’t met last year’s team in person, the group has had some help in knowing where to look for funding, learning to organize their project, and being realistic in terms of planning. They’re grateful for not having to start completely from scratch.

“There are benefits of not being a first-time team. Our supervisors came up with a lot of ideas after last year’s program. We kinda started with the ideas that they ended with.” -Maxime.

One of these ideas was for the journal of the proceedings. The team last year observed the lack of such a document at the Giant Jamboree and this was an observation the current team benefited from. Although there will be no live Jamboree, they hope that people will still take the time to read this peer-reviewed journal about the fascinating iGEM projects this year and feel more connected to everything happening.

As for the competition itself, everyone is appreciative of an iGEM filled summer, which would’ve otherwise been spent lazing around. Being involved and having something this engrossing to work on is keeping the team motivated to keep going.

“Even when we had university, there was a lot of time in between courses so I was glad to have something to do instead of just sitting around.” -Silvio.

As much as everyone loves occupying themselves with iGEM, they also recognize the need for planning and communication to make sure they don’t lose track of anything and keep their final goal in sight.

“The most important thing was figuring out how to not get lost in your work in such a big and complex project. There's always so much going on.” -Eva.

With a team such as this one, with all the closeness and farawayness, it would be remiss to not mention the human need for personal connection. In the words of Silvio,

“Whenever we meet in person it's really nice, it's like, the best.”

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Shrilaxmi
Humans of iGEM

Undergrad student at BITS Goa. Huge nerd. iGEM kid.