The boundaries of scientific feasibility are experiencing a continuous shift, from AI systems designing new drugs in days, to DNA synthesis writing life’s code at scales once unthinkable. Yet not everything that is technically possible necessarily brings value. Our demand on science today is not to act for the sake of creation, for its own sake alone. Given its far-reaching consequences and influence on daily life, it requires conscious control and responsibility in how it is carried out. Human Practices in iGEM is a framework for checking our conceptualization regarding its real-world usefulness and, ultimately, to hold ourselves accountable for what we design.
We have been challenged, doubted, accused, supported, criticized, encouraged, and humbled.
We therefore want to anticipate that we have designed InkSight to the best of our knowledge and belief. In doing so, we have repeatedly confronted differing understandings of fairness, legitimacy, feasibility, ethics, and integrity. And learned from each of them. InkSight, as it stands today, is the result of these conversations: a project whose conceptual and experimental design, safety measures, software tool, communication strategies, and positioning within narratives of art and synthetic biology have been continuously shaped by the many perspectives we engaged with. While this is not the final stage of InkSight, we will continue this reflexive approach in our future endeavours. Not because of a competition, but because it is our responsibility.
Here is what we did.
Flipped Pyramid
We conceptualize our Integrated Human Practices work this year through the flipped pyramid. This narrative choice was made to guide you through our approach. What you see here, are three hierarchical levels of diversity, each of which determines the next:
Click on the layers to explore our approach!
First comes the Stakeholders. Figuring out the diversity of actors relevant to InkSight and where they stand is pivotal because their plane of participation and interest decides over the format of involvement. Sometimes, it is a single expert whose perspective matters, while others represented the realities and interest of broader groups in their activities.
This leads to the second level, the Methods. Logically, the diversity of stakeholders requires an equally diverse set of methods. We decided to explictly diversify our methodological choices, as much as possible, to experiment with formats that provide broader and novel perspectives to our work.
And then comes the crucial part: Integration. It also is the most inherently diverse of all. What emerges here depends both on the stakeholder and the method of interaction. Sometimes complementary to our assumptions, sometimes contradictiory. All useful. Managing this complexity means translating feedback back into every dimension of the project: from wet lab strategy and construct design to governance, ethical considerations, real-world usefulness, and communication. To make this process systematic, all feedback from more than 30 stakeholders was categorized into four overarching dimensions: Science, Culture, AnticipatoryGovernance, and Community.
Of course, the nature of this whole process is an iterative one. Each round of engagement brought us back to the starting point, but with altered perspectives, additional stakeholders identified, new methods chosen, and novel directions for InkSight. We invite you to explore each part below.
1. Diversity of Stakeholders
Before taking action, we mapped our stakeholders by interest, and influence, providing a structured starting point for anticipating their potential impact on the project. Through our work in Integrated Human Practices, it became evident however, that not all of these early assumptions were complete or always precise. Unlike many teams, we focused solely on the Power-Interest Grid, using it not just as a mapping tool but as a basis for deeper engagement, rather than simply applying multiple-yet-similar mapping frameworks to produce repetitive static graphs. This approach allowed us to iteratively update the matrix based on real stakeholder feedback and adapt our strategies as new perspectives emerged.
Stakeholder Mapping Progression
The mapping process was therefore conceived not as a fixed representation but as a dynamic framework that evolved in parallel with ongoing Human Practices work, as seen in the graph above between our initial mapping (biased on pre-existing assumptions) and our final mapping at the current state of our project. Rather than offering a definitive account, the map reflects an iterative effort: to communicate, to reflect upon feedback, and to integrate it in order to approach a more comprehensive understanding of the project’s context.
2. Diversity of Methods
To address the diversity of stakeholders involved in our project, we adopted a diverse set of methods as well. Each approach, whether qualitative, semi-quantitative, creative, or future-oriented, offered a distinct angle and engage with different aspects of InkSight. This plurality helped us move beyond top-down, technically focused meetings, allowing both InkSight and ourselves as future scientists to be shaped through experimental formats and the integration of artistic, empirical, and policy perspectives.
Hover or click each card to find more details about each method!
STIR
Continuing the work of 2024 iGEM Munich's team, we applied the Socio-Technical Integration Research (STIR) framework by Fisher and Schuurbiers (2013) to structure and document our stakeholder interactions. STIR encourages reflection within ongoing research, when technical decisions still evolve but already carry societal implications. Using this approach, we treated each discussion as a space to question assumptions, identify tensions, and recognize how design choices connect to wider contexts. As last year's team, we adapted the original protocol (click here to explore our template) to focus on concrete decision points, embedding reflexivity into our workflow rather than treating it as an add-on. This helped align technical development with ethical awareness, making InkSight more responsive to societal expectations. Scroll down to see STIR present in each of our meetings!
Survey
Given the diverse personal and cultural meanings associated with tattoos, we prioritized understanding public perceptions of our cell-based biosensor tattoo beyond the limited scope of interviews. To include a wider range of perspectives, we launched an online survey to gather empirical feedback on practical, ethical, and personal considerations relevant to the design and implementation of InkSight as a health technology. This initiative was informed by discussions with key stakeholders and supported by expert advice in survey methodology and quantitative analysis. Insights from the survey played a direct role in shaping both our safety strategies and our choice of research targets. Scroll down or click here to learn more!
Art Competition
The art competition aimed to create a shared space between science and the public. Rather than addressing established artists, we reached out to the broader public through social media, encouraging anyone with curiosity and creativity to take part. Participants were invited to propose tattoo designs that fit within the technical limitations of our biological ink. Through this format, members of the public could participate directly by contributing their own designs, as well as possible targets for us to explore. At the same time, we hope the resulting artworks offered a more accessible entry point for those less familiar with scientific discourse by showcasing more interactive, artistic ways of engaging with synthetic biology. Explore the designs in our Education page!
Policy Analysis
From early on, we felt it was imperative to look beyond the technical side of InkSight and explore the futures it might bring. Thinking ahead about potential regulations and socio-ethical implications allow us to anticipate possible risks and misuses of our project. In that effort, the policy analysis emerged as a collective culmination of expert insights, survey data, informal discussions, academic perspectives, and our own motivations to responsibly navigate uncertainty in SynBio. This effort became a core pillar of our Safety work, showing how these aspects guided our conceptual, experimental and impact-oriented activities throughout the project. Scroll down or click here to learn more!
3. Diversity of Feedback
Explore each meeting, event, and interaction to see how reflection shaped our project. Every box includes clickable links to the related STIR protocol (click here to see our STIR template) and the specific elements that were refined or changed based on what we learned.
Science
Contrary to the myth of the solitary lab worker, science is collaborative. In our research, our team repeatedly confronted with questions to which published literature has no answer. These gaps led us to seek collaboration and expert input, underscoring how innovation in science depends on collective insight rather than solitary effort. We consulted on topics of existing cell-based synbio tattos, tyrosinase engineering, MESA receptor designs and software, cell-free prototyping, biomarker detection methods and hydrogel encapsulation strategies. Reflecting on these meetings, we see how our core conceptualization of the project, including experimental and safety approaches, emerge from these interactions.
Expertise: Molecular imaging, neurobiology, and synthetic biology with a focus on cell-based sensors, protein nanostructures, and translational bioengineering.
Institution: Director, Institute for Synthetic Biomedicine, Helmholtz Munich; Professor of Neurobiological Engineering at TU Munich, Germany
Prof. Westmeyer accompanied us from the earliest stages of idea development through all of the bugs and pitfalls of our wet-lab strategy. As our Principal Investigator, his expertise in synthetic biomedicine, cell engineering, and imaging technologies provided a crucial framework for translating creative concepts into realistic experimental plans.
Early on, he emphasized the need to move from conceptual ambition to actionable experimental design, urging us to focus on well-defined readouts, quantifiable outputs, and achievable milestones. Among his feedback, he advised against overly general or late-stage biomarkers like VEGF that we had considered earlier and encouraged us to define clear analyte use cases that align with realistic clinical or physiological timescales. This lead us to meet several more experts on biomarkers, including Prof. Dincer, Prof. Holdenrieder and Dr. Chen.
The Graveyard
Every ambitious project leaves behind a trail of fallen ideas — some bold, some bizarre, all dearly missed. Here lie ours, laid to rest by the voice of reason. AKA, other team members, our PI Prof. Westmeyer, and our dear advisors.
Viral Sunscreen
We once envisioned a way to reverse UV-induced skin damage using AAV vectors, engineered for epidermal keratinocyte specificity via receptor mutagenesis and the K14 promoter demonstrated by Shen et al. (2024), to deliver RNA for a photolyase enzyme. Essentially a gene-therapy repair system for sun exposure. After consulting with a virologist, it turned out to be a biosafety level-2 nightmare and far too time- and resource-intensive for iGEM. Prof. Westmeyer agreed to let it rest peacefully.
Magnetic Bacteria
Another early concept aimed to make E. coli form cancer-detecting iron-dense patches through ferritin enrichment for MRI imaging of colon tumors. Unfortunately, eager as we were, we turned a blind eye to the fact that getting good MRI images of the colon (air is the enemy) is the true bottleneck.
Toehold Switch Sensors
Initially, we flirted with the idea of RNA-based toehold switches for detecting biomarkers. But as Prof. Westmeyer dryly noted, toeholds are the PCR of iGEM, overused and underwhelming. The concept was buried quickly in favor of more original directions.
Laid to rest by biosafety, time, and reason — forever remembered.
Expertise: Synthetic biology and bioinspired technologies, with a focus on synthetic cells, microfluidics, biohybrids, lipid nanoparticles, and membrane engineering.
Institution: Chemical Engineering at Imperial College London, UK
We first learned about living tattoos to serve sensory functions in the publication by Allen et al. (2024). We met Dr. Elani to inquire about his motivations and understanding of living cells tattoos, as well as possible ways to implement them. He is part one of the few groups in synthetic biology that have explored living tattoos.
Summary
Dr. Elani emphasized that living cells as in-body sensors offer a major advantage over purely chemical (ink-based) sensors, as they provide access to the full repertoire of cellular signal detection, response mechanisms, and bioengineering tools. This could potentially enable much smarter sensing systems. By this stage, we were already considering mammalian cells rather than bacteria, and one of our main concerns was their longevity. Although not directly comparable, Dr. Elani recommended reviewing stability data from the gene therapy literature for an initial orientation, where transgene expression is often measured over several months or even years (Muhuri et al., 2022). Hydrogel encapsulation was also discussed as a strategy to reduce immunogenicity. Dr. Elani pointed out that the hydrogel’s pore size can be tuned to match the cell type, allowing adequate diffusion of relevant biomarkers. With mammalian cells, a larger size cutoff can be chosen because the size of the cells themselves is substantially bigger and containment thus less restrictive.
During the meeting, we also addressed our concerns about public acceptance of novel biotechnologies, especially involving genetic enginnering. The expert noted that studies and surveys are valuable for understanding how such living-cell-based diagnostic tools might be perceived.
Integration
The meeting with Dr. Elani encouraged us to further pursue the concept of a mammalian-cell-based tattoo, because we recognized significant unrealized potential in the versatility and tunability of such a living sensor platform.
Additionally, we concluded to dedicate efforts into research identify a suitable hydrogel for cell encapsulation as well as the potential value in conducting a survey to assess potential user acceptance for our project. After we had talked to Dr. Elani about the perspective of mammalian cell-based tattoos, we proceeded to contact Dr. Tastanova.
Expertise: dermatology and translational research, combining skills in immunofluorescence, cell biology, biomaterials, and clinical application in skin-based diagnostics
Institution: University of Zurich, Switzerland
The most prominent publication on mammalian cell tattoos as biosensors to us was published by Tastanova et al. (2018) on a biomedical tattoo for detection of hypercalcemia associated with cancer. We met with this expert because in her reserach, she had come as far as in vivo testing in mice over a period of 42 days and thus had gathered valuable insights on the method of implementation and practical constraints.
Summary
A key point for our meeting with Dr. Tastanova was the challenge of visualizing sensor cells when encapsulated in hydrogel within the dermis, compared to the naked-eye detection possible with non-encapsulated cells described in the paper. She explained that hydrogel absorption as an important criterion for material selection had been the particular reason for this observation in her system. Importantly, she cautioned that unwanted cell proliferation could occur over long periods, as well as concern that public acceptance and regulatory requirements would pose significant hurdles. It was suggested we consider alternative applications such as monitoring livestock well-being as a way to initially avoid the resource-intensive process of demonstrating and proving safety required for diagnostic approval. Additionally, she recommended exploring alternative pigments, such as indigoidine, for improved visibility.
Integration
Based on the expert input, we refined our criteria for hydrogel selection and validated the idea of conducting a survey to assess user acceptance. We briefly explored applications in livestock monitoring but concluded that, in order to compete with the widespread use of inexpensive antibiotics and preventive treatments, such a solution would need to be extremely low-cost and simple enough for farmers to apply themselves. This seemed unrealistic at this stage. We also decided to expand our Human Practices work by adding the focus on current regulatory standards for comparable technologies (Policy Analysis), and initiating research into alternative pigments for improved visibility and inclusivity.
Expertise: Professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering, MESA engineering
Institution: Northwestern University, US
A leading researcher in synthetic biology whose lab developed the MESA system, which forms a central foundation for our project. After having drawn up a design for the genetic circuit, its parts and requirements, we met with Professor Leonard for his expertise in the design of the MESA ectodomain for sensory input, its linker length and stoichiometry for expression balance.
In october, we met again with Prof. Leonard to review our MESA Designer software via a live demo, seeking feedback on feature scope, usability, and target users. After he had shaped our project so significantly in our first meeting, we felt he would help to ensure the tool meaningfully supports MESA design within InkSight.
Summary: first meeting
This meeting focused entirely on technical feasibility. Dr. Leonard confirmed that the geometry of receptor ectodomains must be carefully matched to the respective targets to ensure functionality, with optimal linker lengths (~6-10 amino acids) required to prevent steric clashes and instability. There are no clear universal design rules for linker length or receptor configuration, meaning empirical testing and iteration are essential. Very importantly for our Wet Lab strategy, the use of soluble receptor versions was recommended to simplify early prototyping by avoiding membrane trafficking issues. Thus, rapamycin-inducible systems were suggested as a practical alternative to the GFP-induction we had been planning prior for rapid proof-of-concept testing. In the long-term experiments, stable genomic integration is central to ensure reproducibility. For our split tyrosinase design, Rosetta was recommended as the most suitable tool for predicting split sites, especially considering asymmetric splits for improved performance of the conditional activity.
Integration: first meeting
Following this meeting, we decided to test soluble versions of the split MESA receptors with rapamycin as our proof-of-concept system. Additionally, we decided to work in parallel on generating a stable cell line to ensure reproducibility in long-term experiments. For the tyrosinase design of variants, we wanted to use Rosetta and AlphaFold to predict functional split sites, including asymmetric variants. That approach proved partially successful in or wetlab, where we could see some functional split enzymes. Based on the problems we encountered reading about MESA, we came up with the idea of our MESA Designer software - a key tool we worked and developed during our project. We developed our software and then met with the expert again.
Summary: second meeting
The walkthrough validated our current option set and workflows; the interface and usage scenarios were considered clear and useful. Key recommendations were to (i) plan a roadmap for integrating de-novo binder creation and docking utilities (e.g., TMDock) as compute resources allow; (ii) ship ready-to-run structure-prediction configurations tailored to MESA chains, explicitly biasing designs toward close C-terminal proximity of binding domains; (iii) support educational use with a teacher-oriented user guide and a curated set of validated design presets; and (iv) generate a “breadcrumbs” file that records all user selections for full traceability and reproducibility. These suggestions aim to keep the base tool lightweight for broad access while enabling advanced users to scale up.
Integration: second meeting
Building on Prof. Leonard’s positive feedback regarding the tool’s clarity, usability, and practical fit for MESA Designer, we will explore improvements mentioned above in later versions. Our priority is to preserve the lightweight core while considering optional enhancements as time and resources allow. These are exploratory plans, not part of the current release but highlighting the usefulness of our tool for researchers already working.
Expertise: Biochemist specializing in tyrosinase / polyphenol oxidase engineering and protein expression, enzyme mutagenesis and heterologous expression systems.
Institution: Department for Biophysical Chemistry at the University Vienna, Austria
We consulted Dr. Pretzler because of his extensive review work on tyrosinases, giving him a comprehensive overview of the field (Pretzler and Rompel, 2024). Especially his research on mushroom (eukaryotic) tyrosinases along with his publications on tyrosinase engineering, including mutagenesis and LID domain modifications makes him a particularly relevant expert for our project.
Summary
In our meeting with Dr. Pretzler, we discussed the selection and design of tyrosinases for melanin production inside encapsulins. He clarified that differentiating between monophenolase and diphenolase kinetics is unnecessary, since L-DOPA is not typically released. We had considered using short cyclic peptides as inhibitors for regulation, however, the expert ecidedly discouraged this due to their stability and difficulty of degradation. He considered the possibility of regulating the enzyme’s activity via copper availability to be similarly unpromising because copper regulation itself is poor in mammalian cells. Instead he suggested that caddie proteins could help address copper limitations in nanocages. He recommended Verrucomicrobium spinosum tyrosinase as a promising candidate, confirmed that BtMel is inactive, and noted that MmPPOB likely contains a LID domain but may not perform optimally. Dr. Pretzler also emphasized that linker sequences are sensitive to modification, increasing aggregation risk, and that adding bulky LID domains reduces expression. He advised that mutagenesis is unnecessary for our application and that a low Km should be prioritized over high kcat, given the low intracellular tyrosine concentration expected in encapsulated systems.
Integration
Following this meeting, we prioritized enzymes with low Km values in our reaction of interest, given the expected tyrosine limitation in nanocages. He reccomended us exploring BsTyr based on his expertise, confirming our intuition of the presence of a LID domain. We continued exploring all three activation strategies, and agreed on revisiting linker design with particular care to minimize aggregation, and design of splitting approaches despite previous failures. The suppression peptides, caddie proteins, were also pursued. Overall, the most valuable feedback for us was learning about some proteins with limited literature characterization. Because Dr. Pretzler had stressed that prediction and modeling of split variants is only rarely ever successful in wet lab testing, we began meeting experts for possibilities on more high thoughput testing of variants after this meeting. See here our meeting with Prof. Jewett.
Expertise: Cell free systems, artificial cells, and bacteriophages
Institution: Invitris GmbH, Germany
In order to rapidly prototype more than 25 different tyrosinase constructs using cell-free protein expression we needed to design efficient linear DNA templates. We reached out to Sophie von Schönberg, Dr. Kilian Vogele and Dr. Filippo Caschera for their practical expertise and feedback on our experimental design.
Summary
Dr. Caschera advised us that the 5′ and 3′ flanking regions of linear constructs significantly affect stability and translation efficiency and shared his own standard expression template as a reference. Sophie von Schönberg proposed using a three-fragment Gibson Assembly to generate our linear templates, which could then be PCR-amplified to the required concentration. Dr. Kilian Vogele on the other hand suggested a two-fragment Gibson Assembly followed by rolling-circle amplification (RCA) to produce large quantities of DNA, warning that Gibson product concentrations must be carefully controlled to avoid RCA inhibition.
Integration
After these consultations, we adopted the two-fragment Gibson Assembly combined with RCA as our main strategy, enabling us to work within our gBlock quota while maintaining flexibility in our template design. We used Dr. Caschera’s template as a reference and incorporated the recommended flanking sequences to improve template stability. This approach significantly streamlined our construct preparation and set a foundation for reliable, high-yield CFPE experiments. We later met Dr. Vogele again to follow up on our results.
Expertise: Cell free systems, artificial cells and bacteriophages
Institution: Invitris GmbH
After our initial consultation on template design strategies, we met Dr. Kilian Vogele a second time to focus on troubleshooting our failed tyrosinase expressions in cell-free protein expression (CFPE). Drawing on his expertise from both academia and industry, he guided us in refining our experimental setup and prioritizing critical next steps.
Summary
Dr. Vogele recommended prioritizing troubleshooting of expression over purification and advised us to check expression levels using semiquantitative Western Blots before moving forward. He suggested starting with re-expression of a single tyrosinase (BmTyt) rather than all 25 constructs, and to keep parallel cloning efforts in a pET21 vector to enable expression in E. coli if CFPE yields remained too low. For enzyme activity measurements, he highlighted the importance of oxygen availability and advised switching from a 384-well to a 96-well plate format.
Integration
Following his advice, we streamlined our troubleshooting workflow to re-express only BmTyr, implemented Western Blot analysis across purification fractions, and adjusted our assay format to account for oxygenation effects. In parallel, we initiated cloning into bacterial expression systems to ensure a fallback strategy.
Expertise: cell-free synthetic biology, protein synthesis, therapeutics, glycosylation, engineered ribosomes
Institution: Chair for Bioenginnering at Stanford University, US
In order to be able to perfrom rapid prototyping of multiple genetic parts, including tyrosinase variants, we planned to use cell-free expression systems for high-throughput testing and therefore sought expert advice on extract selection, buffer optimization, and quantification strategies for nanocage assembly from Prof. Jewett.
Summary
Prof. Jewett recommended using bacterial extracts rather than PURE (Protein synthesis Using Recombinant Elements) systems, as their higher total protein content supports more efficient nanocage assembly. He gave practical guidance on buffer formulation and DNA concentration optimization, and noted that PAGE gels are a good starting point for monitoring assembly, with FPLC serving as a more quantitative follow-up method. For tyrosinase prototyping, he suggested using GamS to protect linear DNA templates from degradation and recommended the use of CSL tags to enhance protein expression. He also encouraged us to seek additional expertise in protein compartment assembly and explore alternative quantification methods for higher throughput and precision.
Integration
Following this consultation, we refined our CFPE (cell free protein expression) strategy to incorporate CSL tags into our constructs, add GamS when expressing from linear templates, and adjust buffer compositions based on his recommendations. We also began exploring complementary quantification strategies and contacted additional experts to further improve the reliability of our nanocage assembly readouts. He recommended us his esteemed collegue, Prof. Frank to meet in a follow-up.
Expertise: Bioengineer focusing on bacterial protein compartments and virus-like particles (VLPs), with a strong emphasis on cell-free synthesis systems for applications in vaccine design, drug delivery, biocatalysis, and diagnostics.
Institution: University College London, UK
Prof. Stefanie Frank was recommended to us independently by Prof. Michael Jewett and Prof. Daniel Bracewell as a leading expert at the intersection of encapsulin nanocages and cell-free expression systems. We met with her to validate our experimental strategy, clarify which encapsulin variants to use, and discuss reliable ways to detect and quantify cage assembly.
Summary
Prof. Frank recommended Qt encapsulin as the most cell-free-friendly variant, citing robust expression and unambiguous detection, while also encouraging us to include Tm encapsulin in our design space after providing the correct cargo peptide sequence. She confirmed that Mx encapsulin is well-studied but can form multiple assembly states, complicating interpretation. For loading strategies, she suggested using a direct fusion construct with a short linker alongside unmodified encapsulins and an N-terminal cargo signal for efficient encapsulation. She advised replacing magnetic bead-based FLAG purification with Strep-tag resin spin columns for improved yield and reproducibility. For quantification, she recommended adopting size exclusion chromatography (SEC) with detection at both 280 nm and 320 nm, the latter being specific to assembled cages, and suggested native PAGE as a qualitative confirmation method. A potential functional assay using melanin co-localization on gels was discussed but deemed technically challenging at this stage.
Integration
Based on this meeting, we redesigned our constructs to include Strep-tags and appropriate encapsulation signals, expanded our design space to include Tm encapsulin, and adopted SEC with dual-wavelength detection as our primary method for quantifying assembly, retaining native PAGE for qualitative checks. These changes significantly improved our experimental strategy and increased confidence in the feasibility of our project’s core concept.
Expertise: Bioanalytical materials, sensors, and microsystems, combining data science and AI to develop disposable chemo- and biosensors for diagnostics and wearable applications.
Institution: Chair for Sensors and Wearables for Healthcare at Technical University Munich (TUM), Germany
We consulted Dr. Can Dincer because of his expertise in wearable biosensors and health-related monitoring technologies. Most importantly, he adviced us on which biomarkers to focus on for a technically feasible and clinically relevant proof-of-concept.
Summary
Dr. Dincer strongly recommended focusing on interstitial fluid (ISF) rather than blood as the detection medium, due to easier application, lower ethical burden, improved immunological safety, and better feasibility for proof-of-concept. He highlighted that analytes with relatively high concentrations, such as CRP or certain drugs, would be more realistic biomarkers than low-concentration interleukins or protein-bound hormones, which do not diffuse well into ISF. He advised against using electronics for a more nuanced readout to keep the system simple and stressed the importance of encapsulation of the cells within a hydrogel for both cell viability and analyte access. Additionally, he had us consider societal and economic aspects, where acceptance may increase when tied to relevant medical contexts, such as therapeutic drug monitoring, and that oncology-related applications have greater market potential than niche indications like antibiotic resistance. Finally, he raised concerns about privacy and regulatory implications depending on tattoo placement and clarified that the term “tattoo” can sometimes be mistaken for a skin patch in certain fields, highlighting the importance of careful communication.
Integration
Following this meeting, we decided to focus the selection of possible biomarkers on abundant, clinically relevant biomarkers and adopted ISF as our primary detection site. We refined our visual presentation and communication strategy to avoid being misunderstood, and incorporated privacy considerations into our Human Practices strategy to address placement and communication of the tattoo concept. Prof. Dincer’s insights proofed so invaluable to the team, that we reached out to him again in order to organize a joint podcast episode. We eventually reached out to another expert on clinical biomarkers for cancer, Prof. Holdenrieder.
Expertise: Novel biomarkers for cancer, cardiovascular disease, and infectious diseases, with a focus on diagnostics, therapy monitoring, and prognostics
Institution: Director of the Institute for Laboratory Medicine, German Heart Center Munich of the Free State of Bavaria, Clinic at the Technical University of Munich (TUM), Germany
We met with Dr. Holdenrieder, an expert in tumor and cardiovascular biomarkers and director of the Institute of Laboratory Medicine, to get guidance on which biomarkers would be most relevant and feasible for our tattoo-based sensor system. We also wanted to learn about modern detection methods, potential limitations such as patient variability, and gain insights into how patients and healthcare professionals might perceive a diagnostic tattoo.
Summary
Dr. Holdenrieder noted critically that patient acceptance can depend on both the design and permanence of the tattoo. His recommendation is, a temporary, high-quality mark would likely be more acceptable than the framing as a “tattoo”. On the technical side, he recommended initially validating our system with a well-characterized analyte like glucose, since its presence in interstitial fluid (ISF) is well established. He cautioned that some ISF assays lack sufficient sensitivity, and that blood-based assays are generally easier to perform. For cancer monitoring, he warned that results can be heavily confounded by infections, lifestyle factors, and individual variability, leading to false positives. He suggested focusing on drug-related pharmacometrics or cell-associated markers released during treatment rather than cancer markers alone, and to carefully select cancer types with strong blood signatures (e.g., lung cancer or melanoma). He also noted that for clinical usefulness and profitability, the system would need a rapid response time (within hours to a few days) to inform treatment decisions and leverage the benefit of continuous monitoring.
Integration
Dr. Holdenrieder’s input led us to take a more critical point of view on cancer markers as primary biomarker targets, especially regarding their high risk of false positives. We began expanding our research on clinically meaningful drug-related markers and cell-associated signals, with an emphasis on conditions where continuous monitoring could directly inform therapy. For the research on possible biomarker, prioritized analytes with strong ISF presence were prioritized as well as a more pronounced consideration of response time as a key design parameter for our system. To expand our portfolio of possible biomarkers further, we continued on with meeting Dr. Chen, an expert for the detection of progesterone in the interstitial fluid.
Expertise: Biomedical engineer specializing in biosensors, electrochemistry, biomaterials, and gene delivery
Institution: Boston University, US
We contacted Dr. Mingfu Chen who has worked on nanomolar detection of progesterone in artificial fluids. Since progesterone was one of our first candidate biomarkers, we hoped his insights on the feasibility in terms of detection limit and range would help our understanding of whether progesterone may be a suitable target for our systems.
Summary
Dr. Chen explained that while progesterone sensors are highly relevant for fertility monitoring and cycle tracking, current systems face a couple of challenges. For example, interstitial fluid concentrations may be close to the lower limit of detection. His work tested sensors only in in vitro, not in vivo, and he emphasized the need to evaluate cross-reactivity, reuse across multiple cycles, and long-term stability. Additional data he provided showed strong specificity (minimal interference with estradiol, estrone, cortisol, or aldosterone) and versatility, since his platform has also been applied to other molecules and detection methods such as FRET and quantum dots. On the societal side, he underlined the clear market relevance of progesterone monitoring, while also noting that technical maturity remains limited.
Integration
This meeting helped us refine our next steps. We decided to focus on determining realistic detection limits in interstitial fluid, as well as double checking whether the fluctuation of all considered biomarkers were in range of our expected sensor kinetics. Another requirement, the argument of reusability across multiple cycles is key to perceiving the actual added value of the tattoo. If the lifespan is short, the benefit decreases significantly. and began considering hydrogel-embedded, tattoo-like readouts as a minimally invasive application path.
Expertise: Biophysicist researching biopolymers and bio-interfaces, focusing on natural materials such as mucus, biofilms, and cartilage, and their biomedical and biotechnological applications.
Institution: Chair for Biopolymer materials at the Technical University Munich (TUM), Germany
We contacted Prof. Oliver Lieleg to help us navigate the choice of a suitable hydrogel for our cell-based tattoo system after having researched independantly and being overwhelemed by the variety and options. Since the need for a hydrogel had already been raised by multiple experts in previous meetings, we wanted to understand which systems were most promising, what trade-offs to expect, and how to approach testing and optimization systematically.
Summary
Prof. Lieleg provided a comprehensive overview of hydrogel requirements and design considerations that changed our approach fundamentally. Especially the clarification on trade-offs, for example that bio-based gels degrade faster but are generally less immunogenic, while long-term stability (weeks to months) requires covalent cross-linking. He outlined major cross-linking strategies, including UV-curable systems like GelMA, host-guest chemistries, and ionic approaches such as calcium-crosslinked alginate, and explained how these choices impact transparency, stiffness, and cell compatibility. He stressed that hydrogels must be injectable, quickly solidify in situ, and maintain a balance of viscosity and elasticity. Optical transparency was identified as a priority, since it affects downstream readouts that are critical to our concept, and inspiration from hyaluronic acid was suggested for achieving high clarity. We have had our eye on adding additional surface modifications to increase well being and lifetime of our cells. But Dr. Lieleg strongly adviced agianst this, as complexity is increased and which in turn most likely reduces transparency. His general recommendation was to start with the simplest system, check transparency and stability under relevant conditions, and only move to more advanced materials like self-healing hydrogels if initial results are unsatisfactory.
Integration
Following this meeting, we compiled a shortlist of candidate hydrogel systems and began evaluating them based on transparency, stability, and ease of use. At the same time, staying with the hydrogel idea, we explored novel materials (which are not yet approved for human use) and regulations on the use of hydrogels as medical devices.
The development of any powerful new technology carries a profound responsibility to anticipate and mitigate potential risks. With InkSight, we consulted with several experts to better reflect on the biosafety and biosecurity implications of our work, ethical biases inherent to our research, possible regulatory frameworks, and intellectual property legislations that we could follow. All these efforts became reflected in our policy analysis which itself was one critically important foundations of our Safety work.
Expertise: Respiratory virologist specializing in infection epidemiology, innate immunity, and human-derived tissue models, with a strong focus on biosafety, biosecurity, and dual-use research policy.
Institution: University of Muenster, UKM University Hospital Muenster, Germany
We reached out to Dr. Sriram Kumar, whom we had first met in Münster, after learning about his extensive experience in biosafety, biosecurity, and policy analysis, including work for iGEM HQ. Since our project raised not only technical but also societal and regulatory questions, we wanted his perspective on how to strategically integrate safety into our design and how to approach a meaningful policy analysis.
Summary
Dr. Kumar raised the importance of considering both biosafety and biosecurity, not just how our system could fail, but how it might be misused by bad actors. He outlined different levels of misuse, from design to application. On a more positive note, he encouraged us to frame accessibility as a strength because unlike continuous blood sampling, a medical tattoo could reduce hospital visits. On implementation, he discussed whether tattoos should be delivered in medical practices or in tattoo studios, pointing out the training, licensing, and hygiene challenges of the latter. He recommended starting in controlled medical settings, where oversight and trust are higher, before considering a broader rollout. Economically and legally, he explained that this stepwise approach would be more feasible, since adapting tattoo studios to hospital-grade biosafety standards is unrealistic today. On the technical side, he confirmed the importance of our kill-switch.
Integration
Dr. Kumars feedback gave us guidelines on how to best structure our policy analysis to explicitly distinguish biosafety from biosecurity and incorporated speculative future scenarios as a way to address long-term implications. We also gained some clarity in for future outlooks regarding potential implementation pathways, focusing on medical professionals first, treating broader rollout to tattoo studios as a long-term scenario requiring new regulation and training. In addition, we began exploring the concept of centrally licensed “medical tattoo” units in urban centers, and we integrated Dr. Kumar’s advice on safeguards and communication into both our technical Design and our Human Practices work. We did however, feel it was necessary to further meet Dr. Bohne for exploring guidelines and laws regarding Biosecurity.
Expertise: Specialist in biological safety, coordinating regulation, oversight, and risk assessment for genetic engineering and biosafety operations
Institution: Medical School Hannover, Germany
We met with Dr. Jens Bohne, recommended to us by Dr. Fritsch from the Leopoldina, to clarify the legal and regulatory context of our project. Since our work involves mammalian cell engineering, we wanted guidance on biosafety classification, accountability, and how German and EU frameworks differ in practice.
Summary
Dr. Bohne underlined the importance of self-governance in science, since legislation often lags behind research, and noted that in worst-case scenarios accountability mostly lies with physicians applying the system. On regulation, he clarified that biosecurity and dual-use are not explicitly covered by German law but addressed through decentralized committees, while EU rules hold more weight in clinical contexts. He suggested that approval as a cell therapeutic might be more straightforward than as a medical device. From a technical perspective, he confirmed that Cas-based integration would fall under biosafety level S1, while retroviral approaches would require S2, and found our proposed kill switch concepts (e.g., acyclovir / penciclovir sensitivity) to be important safeguards.
Integration
After this meeting, we incorporated a risk analysis, including misuse, into our policy analysis. Our assessment and considerations regarding aspects of approval have also been incorporated into our Safety work, as these are partly speculative, very long-term prospects. We also prioritized our kill switch strategy further and added an analysis of the classification as medical device or cell therapeutic to decide on approval routes to our policy analysis. This meeting in turn made it very clear to us, that a realistic risk assessment can only be seriously attempted if ethical conflicts are taken into account. Therefore see here next, for our meeting with an expert in medical ethics.
We consulted an ethics researcher with a background in medical ethics to discuss the societal and justice-related implications of our tattoo biosensor concept. Previous consultations had focused on technical feasibility, but here we aimed to address questions of autonomy, privacy, accessibility, and proportionality of invasiveness to benefit. While this expert prefered to stay anonymous, they nevertheless stressed that taking their feedback into account was crucial for the project’s development and credability.
Summary
The expert raised concerns about autonomy and the risk of coercion by external parties, which stressed the importance of ensuring that users have, at all points in time, the choice on whether they want this tattoo to be applied. Additionally, privacy risks were highlighted, particularly potential misuse in contexts such as reproductive control, where patriarchal structures have been established historically as means of control. Suggestions included user choice of motifs as a way to improve inclusivity and discretion. Technical issues such as reversibility, kill switches, and visibility challenges on darker skin tones were also discussed, leading to the idea of testing alternative pigments. Economically, the expert warned of inequalities if the product became a lifestyle tool accessible only to wealthy users, and questioned cost-benefit proportionality for health systems. Alternatives such as centralized administration were noted as possible risk mitigations, though they may reduce accessibility and raise justice concerns.
Integration
This meeting clearly demonstrated that our project still contains several conceptual weaknesses that must be thoroughly addressed in the future. Four central ethical criteria emerged: first, proportionality, i.e. identifying cases where the benefit justifies the inherent invasiveness of a tattoo-based sensor; second, autonomy, since unlike many treatments this system cannot simply be detached at will; third, justice, both in terms of economic accessibility and inclusivity across different skin tones; and fourth, privacy, particularly the risk of misuse by third parties. We had already recognized some of these as severe challenges and began addressing them, for example by researching alternative pigment options and pushing forward the policy analysis. Yet, many of the ethical questions remain difficult and perhaps impossible to resolve to universal satisfaction. We chose to address these conundrums openly and, we hope, humbly in our bias acknoledgement and outlook.
Expertise: Patent attorney with a background in protein chemistry, specializing in intellectual property for chemistry, biochemistry, and pharmacology, including patent litigation and freedom-to-operate analyses.
We reached out to Dr. Schiweck, a patent attorney with a background in biochemistry and biotechnology, after one of our team members attended his lecture on patent law. Given his openness to further discussion, we consulted him to understand the requirements, costs, and implications of filing a patent for our diagnostic tattoo concept, and to get a realistic sense of whether pursuing patent protection would make sense at this stage.
Summary
Dr. Schiweck provided an overview of the patenting process, the implication of filing a patent before publishing the project in order to maintain novelty and utilize the patent not just as protection but as “legal blocks” to enable commercialization. On the regulatory side, he speculated that our system would, due to its hydrogel component, likely be classified as a medical device under EU law rather than an ATMP, making CE marking, a certification mark that shows a product meets the health, safety, and environmental protection standards of the European Economic Area (EEA), a more plausible approval route compared to the stricter FDA process for in vivo diagnostics. He advised that using Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) -approved hydrogels could simplify the approval process and that demonstrating functional melanosomes even in vitro would have strengthened any future patent claims. We also discussed societal considerations, with Dr. Schiweck pointing out that framing the concept as a medical diagnostic rather than a cosmetic tattoo would improve acceptance, especially given cultural sensitivities.
Integration
With a better understanding of the overall landscape and underlying pathways, provided by the expert’s insights, we decided against pursuing patenting within the time frame of iGEM, as the investment of time and resources would outweigh the benefit before we have concrete results. Instead, we focused on improving how we communicate the technology, clearly framing it as an innovative diagnostic tool rather than a cosmetic tattoo. The meeting had us realize that more research had to go into the classification of this technology in order to understand regulatory and approval demands. This realization urged the plan of conducting a policy analysis further. We also again refined the criteria for hydrogels to prioritize GMP-approved hydrogels options. This meeting was one of the decisive factors in contacting Prof. Lieleg for his expterise on hydrogels.
Throughout our time in iGEM, we increasingly felt the need to explore in detail the legal, social, and ethical dimensions of a health-monitoring technology like InkSight. Because we deeply believe that understanding InkSight means not only explaining what it is today, but also imagining what it could become. By thinking ahead about future regulations, possible implications, and the social futures such a technology might bring into reality, we can learn how to approach it responsibly and ensure that accessibility, inclusivity, privacy, and safety remain at the core of InkSight from this day onwards.
Therefore, we think of this policy analysis as the culmination and expression of multiple sources that deeply shaped the way we think and act about our project: informal conversations, our own concerns with responsible innovation in biotechnology, expert guidance, survey results, insights from outreach events, and academic work exploring ethical and social dimensions of synthetic biology. Some of the key elements in the policy analysis, for instance, were inspired by:
Dr. Tastanova, Dr. Bohne, and Dr. Schiweck, who shared key insights into regulatory and biosecurity pathways, helping us navigate EU frameworks for ATMPs and medical devices.
Dr. Kumar and Dr. Rahm, who encouraged us to reflect on accessibility, safety, and the psychological implications of cell-based tattoos, while Mrs. Dumitriu and Mr. Silveira brought valuable socio-ethical perspectives on possible use cases.
Survey participants that emphasized the importance of ethical and privacy concerns, as well as the need for robust safety and containment strategies.
Tattoo artists who opened unexpected yet essential conversations about the regulatory landscape for tattoo components, studio practices, and the training required for future biomedical applications.
The result is a living document that reflects these aspects. It draws inspiration from the work of several iGEM teams we look up to, such as Bielefeld-CeBiTec 2020 efforts on DURC and Leiden 2022 commitment to merge safety, legal and ethical considerations. Our Policy Analysis is organized around the following sections:
Regulatory Framework: Classification of InkSight under ATMP and MDR regulations, implications for approval, including regulatory pathways and previous precedent cases.
Biosecurity and Dual-Use: Oversight mechanisms to prevent misuse and ensure responsible research, in the context of the Dual-Use Research of Concern (DURC) framework in the EU.
Biosafety and Containment: Design, production, and application safety aligned with EU and German standards, including respective agencies in charge of enforcement.
Tattoo Studios: Legal and ethical groundwork for a future hybrid model bridging art and medicine, envisioning ways to promote collaboration with medical practitioners and proper certification.
Ethical and Societal Implications: An in-depth exploration of aspects like consent, privacy, psychological impact, and equitable access as core elements that stem from a possible future use of InkSight, taking into account possible benefits and how to prevent potential situations of misuse.
This policy analysis became a key backbone of our Safety work, one we deeply encourage you to explore in the respective Wiki page. It guided our conceptual practices and served as an input for team discussions on the importance of biosecurity, biosafety, ethical reflection, and responsible design in the development of emerging biotechnologies. We hope that the document shown below can inspire future teams to also engage with the difficult conversations and sometimes daunting language of legislation. Our responsibility as researchers is to explore these aspects if we truly aim to bring into the world scientific innovations that are inclusive, and ultimately beneficial for our communities.
Culture
Tattoos are a form of art expression. Therefore, considering artistic perspectives and their interaction with synthetic biology was essential for a project like InkSight. Interdisciplinary encounters with tattoo studios and bio-artists inspired us to further collaborate in activities, such as our tattoo designs art competition, and opened up conversations surrounding containment, security and ethical implications.
Expertise: Pioneering BioArtist working at the intersection of art and science, specializing in microbiology, infectious diseases, robotics, artificial life, and art-science ethics.
Institution: Artist in Residence at The University of Oxford, and at Public Health England, Director of the Institute of Unnecessary Research
Considering we wanted to embrace the inherent artistic element in our project in the use of body art, like tattoos, we reached out to Anna Dumitriu. She is a leading bioartist working at the intersection of art and synthetic biology, to explore how we can, given the opportunity, collaborate with artists. Anna Dumitriu has exhaustive experience in projects dealing with biology as a medium.
Summary
Anna Dumitriu highlighted the ethical risks of making health information visible on the body, such as potential misuse in patriarchal contexts or abusive situations. She reminded us of the historical weight of tattoos, including associations with the Holocaust and forced body modification, and stressed the importance of framing our project in a way that prioritizes agency, consent, and accessibility. She encouraged us to use aesthetics to invite curiosity rather than shock, and to avoid using fear-based messaging. We also discussed the importance of reversibility and temporality in our system, both for safety and for public comfort. Anna suggested collaborating with tattoo artists and using materials like fake skin, agar blocks, or hydrogels with melanin for workshops where participants could “tattoo” a surface themselves in order to turn the technology into a hands-on, demystifying experience. She also gave concrete communication advice, reminding us to adapt our language for different audiences and not assume prior biological knowledge, even when speaking to scientific peers.
Integration
This meeting inspired us to dedicate a full-team session to refining our storytelling and visual language, ensuring we communicate in a way that invites understanding and collaboration. We updated several of our visuals, coordinated an art competition, and connected with local tattoo studios, even attending a tattoo fair to collect feedback from practitioners. Anna Dumitriu’s input also informed our safety considerations and policy analysis, helping us address societal implications and frame future scenarios more thoughtfully. Through her, we learned about Prof. Torres-Padilla, a researcher in stem cell biology that repeatedly collaborates with artists inside her lab and talked to her.
Expertise: Biofuturist developing speculative biodesign solutions by integrating biological patterns, materials, and logic to anticipate future challenges.
Institution: Carlos Silveira Design
We got in touch with Carlos Silveira, a biofuturist and leading figure in iGEM’s BioArt projects, to exchange ideas on how artistic thinking can shape scientific design. Even after refocusing our project on its diagnostic aspects, we found that this dialogue continued to influence how we approached communication and aesthetics.
Summary
Mr. Silveira reminded us that tattoos already carry strong cultural and identity meanings and should therefore be treated with subtlety, particularly regarding privacy. He encouraged us to consider doctors as potential collaborators to explore what patterns or readouts would be most meaningful to them. He also pointed to posthumanist perspectives, suggesting that our work could open new ways of thinking about future bodies and technologies. On the economic side, he noted that trust and safety will be central to acceptance of the idea, and asked how companies might misuse such a technology. From a material perspective, he stressed that even the choice of hydrogel shapes perception, since people carry predispositions about biomaterials, especially since they are most commonly known for their applications in the beauty industry. For functionality, he voiced that clarity and readability should be favored over purely artistic considerations, and that tattoo artists will eventually need guidelines on thickness, line shape, and patterns. Finally, he made a point of the value of speculative futures for storytelling, allowing audiences to imagine how everyday life might look if such tattoos were widely used.
Integration
Together with Dumitriu’s feedback, the meeting led us to give greater weight to the cultural and historical dimensions of tattoos as part of our communication and present in our webpage design, showing that tattoos have carried functional and medical roles across societies for centuries. Inspired by his suggestion to involve tattoo artists, we organized an art competition and even attended a tattoo fair to gather feedback from practitioners. Mr. Silveiras concerns about privacy also shaped policy analysis, where we further explored risks and safeguards when such a tattoo would interact with the broader world.
Expertise: Stem cell biology, epigenetics, and regenerative medicine
Institution: Helmholtz Pioneer Campus and Faculty of Biology of the Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich (LMU), Germany
After our inspiring exchange with artist Anna Dumitriu, whose Artist-in-Residence project “The Mutability of Memories and Fates” at the Institute of Epigenetics and Stem Cells (IES) at Helmholtz Munich brought stem cell research into dialogue with art and culture, we were curious to learn more about the institutional perspective behind such collaborations. We therefore reached out to Prof. Maria Torres-Padilla, for her advice on how artistic practice could be used to engage audiences that might otherwise feel excluded from scientific conversations without oversimplifying its depth.
Summary
Prof. Torres-Padilla has long recognized that artists can play an important role in science communication by translating complex research into more emotionally accessible forms. She described her own practice of inviting artists into the lab to work alongside scientists and later presenting the outcomes in exhibitions and workshops, noting how this helps different publics connect to science in a personal way. She emphasized that the subjectivity of art can be a strength, allowing audiences to interpret concepts tattoos in ways leaves room for their own experiences. We also discussed our ongoing art competition and how outreach to tattoo studios, art schools, and freelance artists could benefit from this approach. She recommended involving artists earlier in the research process in future projects so they can build a deeper connection.
Integration
The meeting helped us greatly to tie up loose ends. We repeatedly received feedback on how different the needs of various segments of the public are when it comes to communicating health-related topics and fears, for example through the survey. However, one thing is at least as clear: from the perspective of those working in the health sector, education and extensive communication are essential. The fears and rejection that arise as soon as buzzwords such as genetic engineering, etc., are mentioned are enormous, especially within Europe. To openly address questions such as: Will my own cells be affected? How does it all actually work, and where are concerns justified or unjustified?
A steady buzz of machines, the smell of disinfectant and a kaleidoscope of ink designs covering every wall was welcoming our lovely team members Emma and Anna at the doors of the Munich DreamInk Convention.
Fearing that they might yet be tempted to get matching sister-in-suffering tattoos in the form of a handshaking bacterium (Emma—bacterial lab) and a mammalian cell (Anna—cell culture) during the course of the day, our two courageous ambassadors approached the people in the scene and encountered an exceptionally open and welcoming community.
Many professional tattoo artists were not only enthusiastic about the concept's potential (some even joked about putting it on their posters one day!) but also claimed to be willing to undergo specialized training in order to offer such a technology responsibly to clients.
When talk turned to the technical side, the conversation shifted to needles, viscosity, and sunlight. Artists pointed out that whatever “bio-ink” we imagined would need to behave like the inks they already use, flowing smoothly through existing machines to avoid unnecessary skin trauma. Several also raised UV light as a likely enemy for fear of fading or destabilization under sun exposure. Of course this is the inevitable fate of this functional tattoo. This fact has led to some consternation, precisely because the central characteristic of traditional tattoos is their permanence, which lasts a lifetime. Here we see that our use of the term “tattoo” crashes a paradigm.
From an economic perspective, the community immediately recognized a niche: a high-end service for clients who seek something more than decoration. Many considered it to have potential to be an addition to their professional repertoire.
The atmosphere of curiosity and openness was encouraging, and the positive reception gave us confidence that such an idea could resonate within tattoo culture. At the same time, the genuine practical questions to better understand a possible implementation process and the feedback reminded us that the real work lies in addressing the technical and implementation challenges raised, from material properties to safety.
Community
A project like InkSight inevitable needs to explicitely consider the perceptions, attitutes and realities of people who will eventually end up implementing or using our tattoo. To that end, we conducted a survey to collect empirical data on socio-ethical considerations around health monitorinng technologies, whose analysis deeply guided our safety, outreach and communication strategies. At the same time, talking to health-care practicioners, insurance companies, and patients helped us understand and reflect on the real-world scenarios in which our selected targets are embedded.
Survey
The use of tattoos has several meanings for different people. Considering that, a key priority for us was to explore public perceptions of our project beyond the always-limited number of interviews we could conduct, while also gathering quantitative social data related to InkSight. To that end, we conducted an online survey to collect empirical data on practical, personal, and ethical considerations relevant to the design and implementation of cell-based biosensor tattoos, like InkSight, as health monitoring technologies.
We were inspired by multiple conversations with several stakeholders, including Dr. Elani and Dr. Tastanova, to try to understand perceptions around a novel biotechnology that has not been that heavily explored in academic literature. At the same time, we got the advice and assistance of Mr. Schlichting and Mr. Barrientos, experts in statistics and quantiative sociology”, to understand the limitations, design biases, analytical possibilities and the possibility to perform more interesting and infromative data analaysis, like the use of Latent Class Analysis (LCA).
The online survey was shared between July and August of 2025 through our social media channels and academic networks of team members to reach an interdisciplinary audience. A total of 246 responses were gathered, with all data anonymized and compliant with GDPR. Recognizing an inherent self-selection bias (see Limitations of the Survey), the demographic profile of respondents reflects the perspectives of a predominantly young adult population, with nearly half reporting experience with wearable health devices, and most having at least some familiarity with genetic engineering. More detailed information can be found in the Sample Demographics section.
Main Results
One of the key objectives in our analysis was to determine whether there are statistically significant differences among different groups of respondents in how they perceive a project like InkSight. This involves understanding diverse perceptions and addressing them by considering relevant social science factors such as gender, age, and general attitudes toward tattoos. In this context, an important result we want to highlight is the statistically significant difference observed between respondents with previous/current experience using medical devices and those without it:
As shown above, initial willingness to try the biosensor tattoo varied notably between these groups, tending to be somewhat higher among individuals who have used medical devices before. This result resonates with some of our initial assumptions, suggesting that familiarity with similar technologies may influence openness to new biomedical applications. Additionally, this insight prompted several informal discussions about what qualifies as a “medical device” for different people and within regulatory frameworks (for example, common items like band-aids are classified as medical devices, which surprised our team members while reading into EU Regulations for the Policy Analysis).
Following other topics, we asked possible areas of application for InkSight, based on a short project description we provided, with the intention to identify specific use cases and target populations where the biosensor tattoo could offer the greatest value or interest:
The most relevant application areas for respondents are management of chronic conditions, early detection or preventive health monitoring, and tracking hormones or biological cycles. In direct response to this, we have prioritized research on biomarkers such as cardiac troponin I (cTnI, TNNI3) for its critical role in detecting cardial tissue damage, and progesterone for its importance in tracking hormonal cycles and reproductive health. You can see more of our research on that in our Targets subsection.
Looking more in-depth at attitudes toward progesterone, we identified statistically significant differences between genders, with male-identifying persons showing less agreement regarding the usefulness of the tattoo compared to female-identifying respondents. We considered this element in the context of possible ethical and social implications of our project, as described on our Description page and discussed in greater detail in our Policy Analysis.
Safety is a key priority for our team, and we have carefully examined safety-related concerns across different aspects of our project. To this end, we conducted an in-depth analysis of participants’ safety perceptions regarding the biosensor tattoo. Using a statistical approach known as Latent Class Analysis (LCA), we grouped respondents based on their answers to several safety-related questions (further details in the subsection below). For analytical clarity, responses on a 1-5 scale were recoded into two categories: “low” (1-3) and “high” (4-5). The best-fitting model revealed two main attitudinal profiles: a larger “Skeptical of Safety” group (67.7%), which expressed doubts about the tattoo’s safety and were less willing to try it, and a smaller “Tattoo Optimists” group (32.3%), which was more open and positive toward the technology and safety of its components.
In the figure, the bars represent the probability that people within each group chose higher or lower agreement levels on each question, showing how likely members of each group are to perceive a technology like InkSight as safe. These findings are exploratory and reflect perceptions rather than behaviours, given that the survey was self-selected and may overrepresent individuals already interested in science or technology. Nonetheless, we consider these results highly relevant, especially as they show that the concept of GMOs, more than any other topic, continues to influence public attitudes within existing narratives about synthetic biology (Marris, 2015).
In addition, the significant prevalence of safety concerns among respondents prompted us to prioritize safety in our project, leading to concrete efforts in conceptualization, governance, and daily practices, as described in our Safety page. Without this analysis, we might not have decided to explore such a comprehensive understanding of the safety issues associated with our technology.
We decided to explore in more detail the open-ended survey responses in order to identify the most salient concerns among participants. As shown in the bubble chart below, safety was a central issue, with specific attention to containment and the implementation of a kill switch. This guided our efforts to design and incorporate a kill switch strategy into our project. Ethical considerations also appeared prominently and were addressed throughout our work, particularly in our Policy Analysis. Concerns about immunogenicity were taken into account through the selection of hydrogel components, while questions of feasibility and technical implementation were integrated into our experimental design and described in detail in the corresponding sections.
The Latent Class Analysis (LCA) was conducted to identify underlying attitudinal profiles among participants based on their responses to safety-related questions about the biosensor tattoo. This method allowed grouping respondents with similar response patterns, providing a typological interpretation of the data beyond individual variables (Weller et al., 2020).
For more in-depth analysis, a series of descriptive graphs was produced to visualize participants’ attitudes and perceptions toward the biosensor tattoo across different variables. The graphs show the distribution of responses to safety-related questions measured on a five-point Likert scale. Participants were grouped by their willingness to try the biosensor tattoo, recoded from the question “How likely are you to try this biosensor tattoo?” into a binary variable: high willingness (“Likely” or “Very likely”) and low willingness (all other responses). All these safety-related questions, and the intial willingness to try the tattoo, were analyzed were later incorporated into the Latent Class Analysis (LCA) described above:
The Latent Class Analysis (LCA) can be seen in the Main Results section. For analytical consistency and parsimony, ordinal Likert-scale variables were recoded into binary (dummy) variables, following the logic low (1-3) and high (4-5), which may have reduced some nuance in attitudinal variation. The two-class model provided the best balance between parsimony and interpretability, as goodness-of-fit tests (G2 = 25.4, X2 = 24.6) indicate an acceptable model fit.
All results are perceptual and exploratory, reflecting attitudes rather than behavioral intentions or real-world adoption. The LCA model, while informative, is sensitive to the limited size of a non-probabilistic, self-selected sample and the binary simplification of ordinal items, which may reduce nuance in attitudinal differentiation.
While our survey provided valuable insights into public perceptions of cell-based biosensor tattoos, several limitations must be acknowledged when interpreting the results.
The survey relied on a self-selected, non-probabilistic sample distributed mainly through social media and academic networks, which likely overrepresents younger participants and individuals with prior interest or training in biology, health, or technology, as observed in Sample Demographics. This design choice introduces an inherent self-selection bias (Elston, 2021), as those already familiar or curious about biotechnology may have been more motivated to participate. Differences in scientific literacy or previous exposure to biotechnology may also have shaped participants’ evaluations of safety, feasibility, and ethics, helping to explain why themes such as containment or the inclusion of a kill switch appeared prominently among open-ended responses. Consequently, the results should not be interpreted as representative of the general population.
In addition, because the questionnaire was mentioned to have an “extensive length” (see our HP meeting below) and included a substantial number of Likert scale questions, respondents may have experienced fatigue (Jeong et al., 2023) or reduced attention toward the end of the survey, which could have affected the consistency and reliability of responses.
Finally, although recoding the ordinal Likert scale data into binary variables for the Latent Class Analysis reduced some nuance in participants’ attitudes, we decided to use this approach because it enhanced interpretability and comparability across variables. LCA is a well-established method in the social sciences (Weller et al., 2020), and in our case, it allowed us to identify clear attitudinal profiles and reveal underlying perception patterns that might have otherwise remained hidden.
Despite these constraints, the survey offers valuable insights into how different publics understand and engage with emerging biotechnologies. The data reveal meaningful variations across prior experience with medical devices, willingness to use the tattoo, application areas, and perceptions of safety. These significant differences challenge the assumption that younger or more (bio)technologically literate audiences form a uniform group [@synbio-community]. While our findings are not categorical, they provide an informative and empirically grounded perspective that enriches our understanding of how diverse publics relate to concepts such as safety, usefulness, and ethical responsibility in the context of synthetic biology and the development of health monitoring technologies.
The survey template below outlines the structure and key sections used to collect participant responses, including demographic questions, attitudes toward tattoos and synthetic biology, and perceptions of biosafety.
It also includes a detailed declaration of consent, in line with Articles 6(1)(a) and 6(1)(f) of the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), ensuring that all data collected is anonymous, voluntarily provided, and used solely for educational and non-interventional research purposes within the iGEM Munich 2025 project. According to institutional guidelines at TUM, anonymous, low-risk surveys of this nature, conducted for academic purposes, do not require formal ethics approval by the Ethics Commission.
Expertise: Statistics and data science, focusing on interdisciplinary applications
Institution: Department of Statistics at LMU, Germany
We contacted Mr. Schlichting, a statistician with expertise in survey evaluation and data visualization, to receive advice regarding the evaluation of our survey. His background in analyzing large datasets at LMU StaBLab made him an ideal expert to help us critically interpret our survey outcomes and refine the way we present results.
Summary
The discussion touched both methodological and societal aspects of our survey design. On the technical side, Mr. Schlichting pointed out that survey length can reduce completion rates and that some of our questions were too complex for non-experts. He recommended handling ordinal data with cross-tables, clearly indicating multiple-answer questions in plots, and avoiding red/green color schemes. He also underlined the importance of categorizing open-ended responses for anonymization and transparency and recommended us to incorporate more open-ended questions in future surveys. From a societal perspective, he pointed out biases caused by self-selection and distribution via our personal networks, as well as privacy concerns for small demographic groups. Additionally, he suggested focusing on key drivers influencing willingness to adopt tattoo-based biosensors and considering recruitment strategies aligned with specific case studies (e.g., progesterone monitoring).
Integration
We were not able to incorporate the feedback regarding the survey design itself, as the survey had already been conducted. However, we did take his input into account for the evaluation and visualization of data. His concerns are mentioned in the limitations of our survey. Most importantly, based on the feedback related to respondents fatigue due to the length of the survey, we decided not to present or analyze in-depth a comparison between initial and final willingness to try a technology like InkSight. After having been made aware of certein limitations to our collected data, we were seeking help from another analysis expert, Mr. Barrientos.
Expertise: Quantitative Sociology, focusing on life-course analysis and data-driven approaches
Institution: Department of Sociology, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile
We contacted Mr. Barrientos due to his background in quantitative sociology and his master’s research applying advanced statistical modeling. His expertise offered an alternative perspective to purely technical or engineering-based analyses. We collaborated with him in the analysis of survey data, mostly the Latent Class Analysis.
Summary
The meeting examined how user attitudes toward the tattoo could reveal distinct groups, offering insights into broader patterns of trust, safety perception, and adoption willingness. It also focused on the feasibility of conducting a Latent Class Analysis (LCA), discussing variable selection, model testing, and validation, as this method provided greater interpretive depth than simpler approaches. Additionally, the discussion emphasized the importance of careful survey design, data cleaning, and variable coding to ensure the reliability and quality of the results.
Integration
This collaboration directly informed the way we interpreted and integrated survey results into our project. Scoring-based analyses were initially considered but ultimately discarded due to their limited ability to uncover underlying user typologies and behavioral patterns. We decided to collaborate with Mr. Barrientos, who conducted the LCA and guided the complex coding and analytical process. He helped us understand how to work with this type of data, while all conclusions drawn, question selection, prioritization, and integration of feedback into the project were developed by our team.
Expertise: Senior physician, head of the laboratory for allergology and special dermatology, and head of clinical studies in allergology
Institution: Tübingen University Hospital, Germany
We consulted Dr. Volc to compare our tattoo biosensor concept with current diagnostic technologies. His clinical background allowed us to explore how both patients and healthcare providers might perceive such an innovation.
Summary
Dr. Volc explained that many dermatologists are skeptical of tattoos, seeing them as a disturbance of bodily integrity, and therefore recommended keeping the tattoo small (around 1 cm) to make it less obtrusive. He suggested that framing the biotattoo as a self-tracking tool could increase acceptance, given recent trends in personalized health monitoring, and noted that exploring alternative pigments would also improve perception. He proposed several alternatives, such as combining multiple tattoos to monitor different markers of one illness and using an app to interpret tattoo signals. Most importantly, he could imagine applications in anticipation of flareups in chronic diseases with periodic symptomatics in ordert o be able to dose respective treatments much more targeted than is currently possible. In this context he mentioned LL-37, a marker that increases prior to psoriasis flareups.
Integration
After this meeting, we did research on the suitability of LL-37 as a therapy monitoring target for psoriasis, where tracking flare-up cycles would provide direct clinical benefit. We confirmed the outer dermis as the most suitable tattoo placement, balancing biomarker accessibility with visibility. And we integrated the idea of alternative pigments and app-based readouts into our long-term design considerations. Afterwards, we met Andrea Rahm, an expert in monitoring of blood glucose.
Expertise: Diabetes consultant and clinical nutritionist
Institution: University of Munich Medical Center at Dr. von Hauner Children's Hospital, Germany
We consulted Andrea Rahm to better understand how patients perceive wearable monitoring technologies. Her experience treating people with diabetes made her an ideal expert to help us compare our tattoo-based approach with established systems like continuous glucose monitors and insulin pumps.
Summary
Dr. Rahm pointed out that patients already experience mental stress with current monitoring systems, and warned against using the tattoo for severe or fatal conditions where the risk of premature self-diagnosis would be too high. From a regulatory and economic standpoint, she noted that reimbursement by health insurance would be difficult under current frameworks, as rules vary widely by company and patient profile. She also cautioned that setting up specialized centers for administering the tattoo would require major investment in training and infrastructure. On the technical side, she explained that while visualization and precision are strengths, tattoos cannot be recalibrated the way electronic devices can, which limits their use in continuous monitoring. As an alternative, she suggested linking the tattoo to a digital readout, which could store and share health data, and noted potential applications in early-warning systems for conditions such as epileptic seizures.
Integration
Based on this meeting, we decided to discard insulin and glucose tracking as potential targets, since these are already addressed by highly developed technologies. And while gradual monitoring, proportional to the concentration and /or signaling duration of a biomarker would be optimal, we were aware from the beginning of this project, that threshold based is the best we can realistically aim for. Improving continuous monitoring conditions expands the scope of possible applications enormously. Similar considerations were made regarding partial digitization. While it could provide a clear benefit in systems capable of displaying continuous concentration measurements, it would, as outlined in our policy analysis, introduce significant GDPR compliance requirements and data protection challenges. Our meetings with physicians led us to approach the counter-perspectice, the one of a patient.
**Disclaimer**: Patients were informed of their right to protect their personal data in accordance with applicable data protection regulations. Each patient was specifically asked to consent or decline to the publication of individual data points, including age, sex, medical conditions, medications, and direct quotations. Only information for which explicit consent was provided has been included here. Additionally, real names have been replaced by fictitious names.
“Keep it simple — something small I can see with the naked eye, that's all I'd want.”
Walter is 83 years old. His heart is currently stable and he is taking Eplerenone and Dapagliflozin as part of the ongoing treatment. In 2017, he received a pacemaker. Since then, he repeatedly experienced episodes of cardiac damage, for example valve insufficiencies. These episodes required his heart to work compensatorily over time. We introduced Walter to the technology by explaining its intended function in the context of troponin I monitoring and what role troponin I plays in monitoring tissue damage in the heart. We stressed its limitations by explaining that no damage can be anticipated and prevented, only registered and subsequently used as information for more sophisticated checks of health with health care specialists. Additionally, the composition was described as genetically engineered cells, contained and with a limited lifespan. The interviewee asked several questions about the implementation process, for example expected level of pain and at which facilities and perseonnel implementation had been conceptualized. He expressed little concern overall and described the concept as a “very nice idea” and noted that it could be particularly helpful for some of the longer trips, which often involve stress, irregular sleep, and limited access to regular health care providers. When asked about his preference for display design, Walter favored a minimalistic, functional approach, with a diameter of at least a few millimeters so it would be easily visible to the naked eye. He also highlighted important practical considerations. Given the advanced age, the skin is thin and sensitive, which limits possible placement options. He recommended selecting an area of the body where the skin is still relatively thick to ensure better integration. Additionally, he noted that patients with similar medical histories often take blood thinners, which could present challenges during the procedure, as it may increase the risk of bleeding.
Agnes
“I like knowing what's going on with my heart. It gives me a sense of autonomy but not everyone wants to be reminded of their health all the time.”
Agnes is in her eighties and has a history of cardiovascular complications, beginning with elevated blood pressure that required long-term treatment with antihypertensive drugs. In 2014, she received a biological aortic valve replacement. Since then, she has developed atrial fibrillation, which led to an emergency admission and subsequent ablation. She notices shortness of breath, particularly when climbing stairs or walking uphill. She currently takes multiple medications, including blood pressure regulators. She is regularly monitored by her general practitioner in a cardiology practice, with ultrasound and blood checks every six months, including blood tests for heart damage markers such as troponin. When introduced to the technology, Agnes self reflected health awareness and positively noticed the possibility for autonomy in managing her condition. However, she also noted the potential for mental burden, recalling how her sister might experience panic when receiving constant health information and that suitability depends on the individual constitution of patients. Agnes was very open to the idea and preferred the idea of a small, minimalistic design placed on her arm, possibly even a small dragon motif for fun. She found it particularly positive that the placement of the tattoo could be chosen, giving users more control and personalization. On the societal side, she emphasized that she sees value in the technology for relieving the health care system, as it could reduce the need for unnecessary hospital visits.
Integration
As skin ages, it becomes thinner, less elastic, and generally slower to heal. As a consequence, tattooing elderly individuals is possible but requires careful planning and a mindful approach because healing times are typically longer, and placement cannot always be chosen freely. Selecting areas with more fatty tissue, such as the outer thigh, outer arm, or forearm, can reduce pain and support better healing. Additionally, minimalistic designs with clear lines tend to heal more reliably on mature skin. For all of these reasons, the procedure should be performed by a tattoo artist experienced in working with older skin whenever possible.
Tattooing individuals who take blood thinners poses additional risks. Some bleeding is normal during tattooing, but anticoagulant use can significantly increase bleeding, bruising, and the chance of infection. The National Blood Clot Alliance advises against getting a tattoo while taking anticoagulants for these reasons. We could not identify direct clinical studies specifically evaluating the risks of tattooing on blood thinners, likely because tattoos are a choice and carry no medical benefit, making such studies ethically and practically uncommon. To establish initial guidance, we referred to the BSDS Guidance on Antithrombotics and Skin Surgery (2023), a UK guideline on managing anticoagulation for cutaneous procedures. Based on this, medical counseling before tattooing is crucial. A physician familiar with the patient's medical history and current medication should be consulted to evaluate risks and determine whether any adjustments to treatment are necessary prior to tattooing.
Health Insurance Coverage
As part of exploring the question of accessibility from an economic perspective, since our diagnostic tattoo is not conceptualized as a lifestyle product, we contacted German health insurance providers to understand how technologies are evaluated for coverage.
The response we received quickly corrected this view: health insurances have no regulatory authority in this matter. Instead, they are bound by law to follow the binding guidelines of the Gemeinsamer Bundesausschuss (G-BA) and the federal government. The G-BA is the central decision-making body in the German health system, determining which diagnostic and therapeutic methods enter the catalog of reimbursable services for the statutory health insurance (GKV).
Decisions are based on strict criteria: a method must be “sufficient, appropriate, and economically viable” and its benefit must be demonstrated through scientific evidence (Gemeinsamer Bundesausschuss (G-BA), 2024). Insurers, hospitals, and medical associations are represented in G-BA committees, but their role is advisory and bound to the final decision. For diagnostic methods, it is not enough to measure a biomarker reliably, there must also be evidence that its detection improves patient well-being. Thus, inclusion in the reimbursement catalog goes well beyond regulatory approval by the EMA (European Medicines Agency). Even once a product is approved as safe and effective, it still requires proof of added clinical benefit to be covered by the statutory health system.
Integration
This exchange confirmed that reimbursement pathways are centralized and legally regulated. Health insurers cannot choose which innovations to support. Instead, they must adhere to the G-BA’s decisions. For projects similar to ours, this means that long-term implementation would hinge on providing evidence of clinical utility and navigating the G-BA evaluation process. The insight also broadened our Human Practices perspective. To translate synthetic biology tools into healthcare, engagement must go beyond technical feasibility and public acceptance. It must account for governance structures that ensure fairness, safety, and cost-effectiveness. Several of these aspects are present in our Policy Analysis.
Bias Acknowledgement
We are a team of scientists, and we wish to be transparent about our own perspectives. Naturally, as most teams in iGEM, we hold a bias: we are not afraid of genetic engineering. We approach it as a tool that comes with risks, but also immense potential when applied responsibly. Public concerns surrounding biotechnology are not simply misunderstandings, as we have learned they often reveal real ethical and social questions that remain underexplored within the controlled space of the laboratory. Sometimes these narratives stem from contexts where media and popular culture may amplify dystopian scenarios. Concerns about “hackable cells” or manipulation before implantation, for instance, are unlikely scenarios. Yet, these fears must be heard and understood, not dismissed, as they often express broader anxieties about trust, control, and safety.
We see art and playfulness as possible bridges into these conversations. Artistic or emotional engagement can lower barriers and invite people to explore technologies that might otherwise feel intimidating or abstract. However, this can only ever be the beginning of a conversation, not its end. Understanding biotechnologies requires both openness and education. Our tattoo may carry an aesthetic dimension that we really ought to explore across our work, but its purpose remains diagnostic and medical. It is not meant to be an accessory, but a tool that could, in principle, contribute to healthcare accessibility. The balance between embracing the artistic side with the fine-tuned preciseness of reliable health monitoring technologies is hard to get: we aim for InkSight to be a form of art expression, but we also need it to be accurate and precise if health choices might be taken based on its output. Within this dilemma, we chose to embrace responsibility as a starting point to act: communication must always include clarity about purpose, safety, privacy, consent, and limitations. In that regard, the work by Deplazes-Zemp et al. (2020) really opened our eyes into the benefits and fallbacks of a technology like the one we proposed.
We hope the reflexive practices we explore here through STIR help us make sense and challenge our assumptions in our future endeavours. We must be aware of our privileges, of our biases, of the impact of our choices, and of the futures we bring into existence with our project. Ultimately, our position reflects the privilege of scientific literacy, and an interdisciplinary one at that, shaped by our close engagement with Science and Technology Studies (STS). It allows us to recognize (and ideally question) both the transformative potential of synthetic biology and the limits of our own techno-optimism.
Integration Summary
This section offers a concise overview of how feedback shaped our project across several key dimensions, summarizing the integration processes already detailed throughout our Integrated Human Practices work.
Safety and Security:Safety was not treated as an afterthought but as a design principle. Discussions with clinicians like Dr. Holdenrieder and policy experts such as Dr. Kumar revealed concerns around immune responses, clinical monitoring, and potential misuse. Public survey results reinforced these insights, as 67.7% of respondents indicated safety-related concerns, a pattern further clarified through Latent Class Analysis (LCA). In response, we integrated a pharmacologically controlled iCasp9 kill-switch, chosen for its proven reliability in clinical contexts, explored different encapsulation strategies and analyzed the use of hydrogel as a scaffold for containment and transparency. Feedback also led us to explicitly address misuse scenarios and data privacy within our Policy Analysis. These elements culminated in the three-levels approach that we adopted to describe our Safety and Security work (conceptual, regulatory, and general lab safety).
Biomarkers:Specialists in wearable biosensors and diagnostic technologies strongly recommended prioritizing interstitial fluid (ISF) over blood as the detection medium, emphasizing abundant analytes with realistic concentration ranges, and the risks of false positives. They helped us identify several potential target biomarkers ranging from drug-related pharmacometrics to physiological hormones. In addition, as a direct response to the survey, we ultimately prioritized cardiac troponin I and progesterone as InkSight’s key diagnostic targets.
Communication: Engagement with artists, cultural practitioners, and diverse publics fundamentally influenced how InkSight is framed, visualized, and communicated. Bioartists emphasized the profound ethical weight of making health information visible on the body, encouraging messaging strategies that prioritize individual agency and intellectual curiosity over fear-based narratives. Direct interactions with tattoo practitioners opened up collaboration opportunities in our education activities around ink viscosity and UV stability. They also highlighting semantic tensions between “tattoo” as permanent cultural practice and the biosensor’s intended temporary nature. This multifaceted feedback informed refined visual language and historical contextualization of functional tattoos. This dialogues also revealed a delicate tension that eventually could not be resolved through external feedback alone, leading to a deep reflection and transparent acknowledgement of our inherent biases and internal positioning. We found that as scientists, our communication strategy has to balance a stimulation to spark curiosity about InkSight with positioning it firmly as a medical tool rooted in scientific responsibility, without any risk of trivialization or overpromising of the technology. Storytelling, both on the Wiki and through our Education work, is heavily influenced by these insights.
Policy :Biosafety specialists, regulatory experts, and ethics researchers fundamentally shaped the project’s approach to safety, security, and compliance through consultations that informed every aspect of risk management and responsible innovation. Biosecurity policy advisors helped distinguish between technical failure modes and intentional misuse scenarios, informing both kill switch development and our policy analysis. Regulatory experts clarified the complex landscape of German and EU frameworks, confirming biosafety level classifications. Medical ethics researchers raised fundamental concerns about autonomy, privacy risks, proportionality of invasiveness to benefit, and justice in accessibility across diverse populations. All of this culminated in a comprehensive policy analysis that addresses regulations and socio-ethical implications that became central to the project’s governance framework, becoming a pillar of our Safety and Security work. Questions that emerged during the writing of the analysis challenged us to collectively reconsider how living diagnostic devices fit within existing regulatory boundaries and talk to more experts. At the end of the day, our Policy Analysis stands as a self-standing document that both informed our project’s foresight and narratives.
Experiments :Bioengineers and protein expression specialists provided essential guidance on experimental strategies and analytical methods throughout the project. Early consultations explored cell-free protein expression (CFPE) for rapid prototyping of tyrosinase variants, though practical implementation proved challenging within the project timeline. More impactful were insights from protein compartment assembly specialists, who shaped the approach to encapsulin characterization through size exclusion chromatography with dual-wavelength detection and native PAGE for assembly confirmation, as shown on our Results page. Expert recommendations also guided purification strategy transitions toward Strep-tag systems and the adoption of rapamycin-inducible soluble receptors for streamlined proof-of-concept validation.
Software (MESA Designer): Continuous feedback from Prof. Leonard, one of the key authors working with MESA worldwide, heavily informed the development of our MESA Designer software tool. These included feature scope, usability improvements, structure-prediction configurations, and educational use-cases to support MESA receptor engineering.
Outro
What you see on this page of our Wiki is a direct result of challenging conversations, survey results, artistic perspectives, mapped activities, literature reviews, and our motivation to engage and reflect on them. All of these experiences made us question our assumptions and, in turn, led to the interaction with more stakeholders, the exploration of different methodological approaches to gather empirical data and novel perspectives, and ultimately to the integration of these various insights into our project. Every aspect of InkSight, from the core scientific arguments, computational design, and experimental choices to the focus on safety and improved communication strategies, are significantly influenced by these practices. We recognize this as an iterative effort, far from a final stage: genuine commitments to responsible innovation, especially within iGEM projects, must continuously question their assumptions and evolve even beyond the competition. Nonetheless, we are deeply thankful to all whose perspectives have shaped what InkSight is today, and what it could eventually become.
References
Escherichia Coli
Human Embryonic Kidney Cells
Modular Extracellular Sensory Architecture
Tobacco Etch Virus
Technical University of Munich
Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München
Förster Resonance Energy Transfer
Ligand Binding Domain
Transmembrane Domain
Intracellular Effector Domain
Generalized Extracellular Molecule Sensor
Synthetic Intermembrane Proteolysis Receptors
Transcription Factor
Human Embryonic Kidney
Human Embryonic Kidney
Amino Acid
Triangulation Number
C-terminal Domain
N-terminal Domain
Split Protease-Cleavable Orthogonal Coiled-Coil
High-Performance Liquid Chromatography
Heterodimeric Coiled-Coiled Peptides
enhanced Unagi (eel) Green fluorescent protein
tetracycline-controlled transactivator
Heterodimeric Coiled-Coil Peptide P3
Heterodimeric Coiled-Coil Peptide P4
circular permutation
Bicinchoninic acid
Bovine Serum Albumin
Erythropoietin
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