Guidance Session with Ritika Sethi (MIT, USA)
Introduction
On July 28, 2025, our team interacted with Ritika Sethi, currently pursuing her graduate studies at MIT, USA, and an alumnus of IISER Berhampur. She had previously represented IISER Berhampur as a part of the iGEM 2021 team, and thus, her experience offered valuable direction and practical understanding of both project development and iGEM workflows. The discussion primarily focused on how to streamline our project management, enhance our presentation of results, and integrate scientific storytelling within our deliverables.
Discussion with former iGEM participant and MIT researcher to refine scientific communication and project design.
To receive experienced guidance on structuring documentation, workflow efficiency, and outreach strategy.
Discussion Summary
The session began with a detailed introduction of Project POSEIDON—its motivation, design objectives, and current progress. Ritika shared constructive feedback on multiple aspects including experimental design, documentation, human practices, and final presentation strategy. Her global exposure and prior iGEM experience helped us understand how to communicate scientific innovation in a more structured, impactful, and accessible way.
- Suggested focusing on clarity of objectives in our documentation and presentation—each section must convey a clear narrative rather than only technical data.
- Emphasized building a strong storyline throughout the wiki, connecting research, outreach, and implementation as a unified whole.
- Advised integrating visual representations (schematics and infographics) to make results more comprehensible for judges and general readers.
- Recommended documenting all versions of design and experiments, even the ones that failed, to demonstrate learning and adaptability.
Project Structuring and Time Management
Ritika highlighted the importance of breaking down the project timeline into parallel task modules instead of sequential dependencies. This would allow wet lab, dry lab, human practices, and outreach teams to function more efficiently while maintaining constant communication loops. She also recommended periodic "mini-sprints" for testing hypotheses and recording incremental progress, ensuring that project outcomes are both traceable and measurable.
Adopted modular task management and periodic review sprints for better coordination between sub-teams.
Integrated shared logs, weekly targets, and transparent record-keeping into project workflow.
- Maintain a unified data log accessible to all sub-teams.
- Conduct short weekly review meetings with concrete goals and outputs.
- Archive all drafts of experimental results to maintain transparency.
- Implement a simple Gantt-style tracker for tracking interdependent tasks.
Wiki and Presentation Strategy
As an iGEM alumna, Ritika stressed the significance of wiki presentation in communicating a team’s vision and achievements. She suggested focusing on concise yet impactful writing, avoiding excessive jargon while retaining scientific accuracy. The visual structure of the wiki should narrate a seamless flow—from problem identification and design philosophy to implementation and real-world relevance. She also emphasized the importance of including human stories—how people and communities connect with our technology—to make our communication emotionally engaging.
- Use storytelling to make the scientific content relatable.
- Balance quantitative data with visuals and short explanatory paragraphs.
- Keep consistency in color schemes and layout across wiki pages.
- Create short explainer videos for public audiences and judges.
- Align all outreach visuals with the central theme of sustainability and inclusion.
Reflection and Outcome
The discussion with Ritika Sethi proved to be immensely helpful in refining our project execution and presentation. Her insights bridged the gap between our scientific goals and how we convey them to diverse audiences—both technical and general. She reminded us that innovation must always be accompanied by clarity and empathy, especially when addressing real-world problems like water contamination. The meeting concluded with her offering to review sections of our final documentation and providing remote guidance as our project progresses toward the Grand Jamboree.
Innovation becomes impactful when paired with clear communication and strong narrative coherence.
Strengthened project documentation, structured planning, and improved presentation readiness for iGEM 2025.
Moving Forward
Inspired by her mentorship, we incorporated her advice into our workflow: restructuring our internal documentation system, updating our project wiki outline, and organizing weekly review meets to track progress. Her session reinforced our belief that effective science communication is as essential as scientific rigor—both together define the true spirit of iGEM.