Synthetic Biology FSP
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Hi everybody and welcome to the new year, although being early March and seeing how much we’ve been through already this year you could be forgiven for thinking we’re already half way through! Bushfires and coronavirus have impacted on many people in many different ways, including SynBioFSP folks.
As we move into a new decade it’s a good time to reflect on the growth and success of the Synthetic Biology Future Science Platform (SynBioFSP), as well as looking to what the future has in store for us.
The SynBioFSP was established in Jan 2017 with a mission is to create and foster a step change in national synthetic biology capability, and ultimately to enable creation of new industries and the reinvention of existing industries via transformative synthetic biology technology. The establishment of mechanisms to develop new people and skills and the necessary infrastructure was central to this.
So where are we at the start of 2020?
To date we have funded 13 ‘blue sky’ research projects within CSIRO, 28 SynBio University fellows, 30 PhD top up scholarships, and supported 4 CSIRO post-docs. We have been extremely active in building the national community, including supporting 3 annual SynBioFSP workshops, hosting the SBA2019 conference, sponsoring numerous other workshops and conferences, and engaging strongly with national and international industry and with State and Federal Governments. Members of the SynBioFSP have produced more than 75 publications with many more in the pipeline; their work has been presented at local, national and international conferences and our people have been prolific in public engagement, talking in many different fora on all things SynBio and science.
The CSIRO research projects and the SynBio University Fellows have had a unique opportunity to explore ‘blue sky’ ideas.
As with any program there need to be checks and balances to evaluate the impact of the investment. Over the latter part of 2019, we met with the project leaders and reviewed progress reports from the SynBio University fellows. In addition, we have held workshops with our key CSIRO business unit partners to better understand the strategic alignment, gaps and new opportunities between the CSIRO business units and the SynBioFSP.
This information has informed our strategic plans and helped us to identify where investment is best placed for the next two and a half years.
The BioFoundry is up and running and servicing a variety of projects. We are learning an enormous amount as we go about operationalising a national service facility! The newly added Sciclone robot is our biggest liquid handling platform yet, that will enable us to automate many routine protocols like plasmid extraction.
Meanwhile, we’ve already begun planning for the 2020 SynBio FSP workshop, to be held at Rydges World Square, Sydney on September 15 and 16. Booking and accommodation details to come.
The workshop will be followed immediately by the first ever Australian Synthetic Biology Challenge Showcase. This is a really exciting initiative which will help grow our national undergraduate training capability in synthetic biology – more on this to come, so watch this space.
Just quickly I’d like to touch on the success of the SBA2019 conference and FSP workshop late last year.
SBA2019 saw 226 national and international delegates attend over three days, resulting in excellent science and commercial discussions, strong industry and government engagement, opportunities for side meetings with key government officials and US based SynBio companies with a view to the future. Eight of the abstracts selected for oral presentation were FSP-funded researchers. To our delight, the venue sold out – demonstrating the massive community engagement and huge growth in synthetic biology in Australia. The quality of presentations was outstanding and the feedback for this meeting was fantastic.
Our FSP workshop immediately following was open to all and was attended by 130 delegates – both FSP and external. We heard application domain overviews and exciting FSP project science updates, and held discussion groups to identify priorities as part of our strategic planning activities. We finished off the day with an Early Career Researchers ON workshop, which was part of the Australian Academy of Science-funded ECR program that ran across both SBA2019 and the SynBioFSP workshop.
Thanks to all those who attended both events and a big shout out to the organising committees that made it all possible – especially Louise Burton and Emily Knauth, who did an amazing job of event organisation and support.
Regards
Claudia
Assoc. Professor Claudia Vickers
Director
CSIRO Synthetic Biology Future Science Platform
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