1.1 iGBA Regional Alliance Team Exchange Meeting

On April 19, 2025, the SCUT-China-L team was invited to participate in the Guangzhou regional iGEM exchange meeting, co-hosted by the iGBA Synthetic Biology Regional Alliance and Southern Medical University. This was the first exchange meeting the SCUT-China-L team had attended since its establishment.

During the event, we first listened to the introduction and report of the iGBA council members, from which we gained a deep understanding of the iGBA alliance and the iGEM competition. Then we listened to the award-winning experience sharing of the 2024 BNUZH-China team, including detailed experience in team management, communication, project design, HP exchange activities, and competition evaluation. This provided valuable guidance for our team in the process of this year's iGEM, and gave us a clearer direction for completing the content of the team's iGEM competition.

Finally, all iGEM teams shared and exchanged their projects, gaining a preliminary understanding of each other's project content. During the exchange, we also identified deficiencies in our project design and received some improvement suggestions. Through this exchange, we have established preliminary connections with other iGEM teams, laying the foundation for future cooperation.

1.2 The 9th South China Exchange Meeting

On May 17, 2025, the SCUT-China-L team participated in the 9th South China Exchange Conference organized by Shenzhen University. The conference attracted more than 20 participating teams, and the interactive exchange provided a platform for cooperation, communication, and mutual learning.

We had in-depth exchanges and idea sharing with various teams, especially those who chose the cosmetics industry like us. By understanding the development direction of various cosmetics industries and feedback from peers, we also had ideas for commercialization, which played a key role in improving our project direction.

We presented our results for the first time in such a formal and large-scale conference. Through this conference, we established connections with more teams in South China and generated more ideas for exchange and cooperation.

1.3 6.1 iBridge Second Exchange Meeting

On June 1st, 2025, SCUT-China-L participated in the second iBridge exchange meeting hosted by OUC-China online. The participating teams included CJUH-JLU-China, NEFU-China, XJTLU-China, and many other teams. This event promoted cooperation and ideological exchange within the igem community, enhancing understanding and communication between various teams.

Our team shared our project content, including the work of iHP, and received suggestions and feedback from other teams and teachers. This made us realize that we could promote our iHP not only among students, but also in society. We also learned from the attempts of other teams, such as OUC-China, who tried to directly request some environmental protection data from relevant government departments.

1.4 Summary of the iGEM Team Exchange Meeting in the Four Provinces of Shanxi, Hebei, Shandong, and Henan

On May 31, 2025, the "Uniting Synthetic Biology, Building an Innovative Ecosystem" Sun-Moon-River Four Provinces iGEM Team Exchange Meeting was successfully held. This event was jointly hosted by OUC-Haide and multiple universities, with nine teams from both inside and outside the province, including LZU-M-C and SCUT-China-L, gathering together.

At the meeting, Zhang Xiaohan, the iGEM East China ambassador, first shared his experience on progress management. Other teams also shared the progress of their current dry and wet experiments, with a particular focus on how the dry experiment could aid the progress of the wet experiment. During the free exchange session, teams delved into discussions around topics such as school-enterprise cooperation and local cultural integration. OUC-Haide shared how they leveraged the school's expertise in marine biology and natural medicinal chemistry to screen target marine biological resources and achieve targeted synthesis of products. This exchange meeting allowed us to gather valuable insights on optimizing experimental feasibility, understand the research content and progress of other teams, and provide references for subsequent project improvement.

1.5 6.28 Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shanghai Exchange Meeting

On June 28th, the SCUT-China-L iGEM team actively participated in the Jiangsu-Zhejiang-Shanghai iGEM Exchange Meeting held at Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University in Suzhou, engaging in productive project exchanges and experience sharing with teams from 18 universities online.

In the sharing session, Dr. Baozhu Han, the liaison officer of iGEM and the coordinator of the Human Practice Committee, elaborated on "what is meaningful human practice". He emphasized that excellent human practice should closely focus on the core of the project, fully presenting the team's thinking twists, social feedback, and practical inspiration during the research and development process. He also pointed out that human practice is different from ordinary science popularization education, and more emphasis should be placed on the two-way interaction between the project and society. In terms of expression form, Dr. Baozhu Han encouraged teams to try diverse and innovative ways such as philosophical dialogue and sitcom to enhance the expressive power and depth of expression. Another guest, Ambassador Zhang Xiaohan, shared practical insights from the perspective of team operation and resource integration based on his nine years of iGEM participation and guidance experience.

In the project presentation section, our team introduced the design and stage results of this year's project to representatives from various schools through online meetings, and also listened carefully to the wonderful reports from other universities. From yeast engineering to cyanobacteria application, from environmental remediation to medical health, different teams have diverse research directions and solid content, showing the broad application prospects and innovative vitality of synthetic biology. During the question-and-answer and exchange process, team members not only exercised their scientific expression and on-the-spot response ability, but also stimulated new ideas through cross-school discussions. This exchange meeting benefited SCUT-China-L a lot in terms of project ideas, practical methods, and team collaboration, injecting new impetus into the subsequent preparation work.

1.6 The 12th China Biological Gene Engineering Machine Exchange Conference & The 2nd Global Biological Developer Conference

On August 6, 2025, CCiC & Synbiopunk 2025 officially opened at the Zhongguancun National Innovation Demonstration Zone Exhibition Center Conference Center. The SCUT-China-L team gained a lot from this exchange conference.

During this three-day exchange meeting, we presented our project, "Brewing Yeast Utilizes Red Algae to Produce Rare Ginsenoside Rh1 and Manufacture Cosmetics," to many domestic teams. In comparison with other cosmetics track teams, we found our own weaknesses. At the conference, many well-known experts and scholars also critically pointed out the advantages, disadvantages, and improvement directions of our project. At the same time, we also participated in the exchange and sharing sessions on commercialization and entrepreneurship, which provided valuable advice for us to further improve our business plan. We will continue to strengthen and improve our deficiencies in the final preparation stage.

On the morning of August 8th, we also gave a presentation and shared our experiences at the conference, which gave us more experience in facing the final finals. CCiC is a very valuable learning experience for us, establishing cooperation and exchanges, expanding our global vision, and contributing our strength in the field of synthetic biology.

1.7 2025 SynBio Challenges

In August 2025, we participated in the SynBio Challenges organized by the Synthetic Biology Branch of the Chinese Society for Biotechnology. This event was not just a professional competition, but also served as a realistic simulation of iGEM.

We were able to showcase our strengths, identify our shortcomings, and gain more experience in sharing on stage and answering targeted questions. This was our first comprehensive presentation from a project to a business plan, where we reflected and compared ourselves with other teams, extracting the essence, and received professional guidance and suggestions from international experts and scholars. This has given us a clearer direction for project improvement.

After experiencing the SynBio Challenges, we continue to expand our international vision, and we have more confidence and confidence to continue to showcase our brilliance in the iGEM finals.

1.8 8.24 Shanghai Exchange Meeting

On August 24, 2025, the Shanghai iGEM Exchange Meeting, hosted by the NACIS Shanghai Carotene iGEM Team, was successfully held. The event featured special guests Mr. Zhang Xiaohan, the iGEM China Ambassador, Mr. Daniel Pan, a cross-disciplinary innovator, and several professors.

Mr. Zhang Xiaohan provided practical preparation suggestions for the on-site team based on the characteristics of the iGEM competition and the experience of previous excellent teams. Mr. Daniel Pan demonstrated how game and modeling technology can assist in the popularization of bioengineering education and provide new ideas for the dissemination of synthetic biology, focusing on the "Wave3d AI creative platform".

During the project presentation session, the SCUT-China-L team and the Jilin University team engaged in a comparative learning session on the field of ginsenoside manufacturing. We exchanged insights on the work content and highlights of wet and dry experiments, aiming to mutually improve and enhance our competitiveness. Through this exchange, both teams gained valuable inspiration in areas such as human practice, project design, and team management. May you all shine brilliantly at the Paris iGEM Global Finals!

1.9 8.30 GenZEC live communication

In order to accelerate the building of our beauty and makeup brand and promote the implementation of entrepreneurial projects, we contacted Teacher Zhang from the "Forbes China Z Generation Entrepreneurial Project Evaluation" and conducted online live communication with him.

We introduced our project and clear commercialization path to Teacher Zhang, hoping to seek more detailed commercialization suggestions and entrepreneurial experience guidance through this platform. Teacher Zhang provided multiple feasible commercialization paths based on the current situation of our team, and proposed to connect us with investors in related fields, as well as provided BP template support channels.

Through this live streaming exchange activity, we have obtained opportunities to connect and cooperate with enterprises through this platform, formed a more comprehensive business plan, and expanded our influence to society from a novel perspective. Our entrepreneurial journey has achieved a big leap forward.

2.1 iGEMer Primary School Series Picture Book Collaboration

In the new exploration of synthetic biology science popularization education, the SCUT-China-L team collaborated with HainanU-China, ZQT-Nanjing, Nanjing-China and other university teams to create a series of picture books for primary school students, "The Fantastic Journey of Hecao Cheng", which translates cutting-edge scientific knowledge into fairy tale language that children can understand.

The project features a cute character named "He Xiaocheng" as the protagonist, and through an adventure story on the "Neuron Continent", vividly introduces the scientific principles of using synthetic biology methods to treat epilepsy, cancer, and synthetic ginsenosides. The SCUT-China-L team fully utilized their expertise in biology and science communication in the collaboration, working closely with other teams to conduct in-depth discussions and careful polishing, from the scientific rigor of the story script to the child-friendliness of the illustration design.

This collaboration is not only an innovative attempt in the form of science popularization, but also a successful example of cross-school collaboration. Each team leveraged their respective strengths, integrating perspectives from multiple disciplines such as biology, education, and art design, to jointly create this unique science popularization work, opening up a new path for the popularization of synthetic biology among young people.

2.2 2iGEMer Junior High School Series Course Collaboration

In July 2025, we participated in the iGEMer junior high school series course collaboration and exchange event initiated by ZQT-Nanjing. Other participating teams included TJUSLS-China, NAU-CHINA, and others. The theme of the event was "from nature, for nurture," aiming to educate junior high school students on environmental protection content related to various team projects, advocate the importance of environmental protection, and popularize certain scientific content.

And this event not only allowed us to communicate and exchange project content among various teams, but also provided us with a deep understanding of how each team's project is related to human society, providing many new ideas for our iHP.

2.3 Cooperation activity with South China Agricultural Museum

On September 13, 2025, we collaborated with the SCAU-China and SCAU Guangzhou iGEM teams from South China Agricultural University to organize an event titled "Synthetic Biology in the Museum: A Grand Feast of Life Science Popularization" at the South China Agricultural Museum.

The South China Agricultural Museum boasts a wealth of resources, serving as an excellent platform for the public to learn scientific knowledge and an ideal venue for science popularization education. Therefore, our three teams hope to fully leverage the platform advantages of the museum, combine museum resources with team project characteristics, and explore educational and entertaining forms such as designing exploration maps, setting up interactive booths, and conducting knowledge explanations, allowing visitors to explore museum exhibits, learn scientific knowledge related to various projects, and grasp basic knowledge of synthetic biology in a relaxed and enjoyable atmosphere.

We anticipate the seamless integration of "scientific research teams, popular science platforms, and innovative approaches" to establish a bridge for dialogue between science and the public. This not only disseminates scientific knowledge but also stimulates public interest and contemplation towards biotechnology.