This page summarizes meduCA’s technical results, highlighting our wet & dry lab goals, results, and future plans.
As a platform with dual-usage applications, meduCA has a number of deliverables to reach which apply to both planetary goals while also branching off into Earth- and Mars-specific objectives. Below, we have laid out our project’s plans based on each planet’s conditions and aimed to highlight the next steps needed to launch meduCA into the market. To keep track of our major milestones, a visual mind map has been created and will be used to walk you through our process this season --- highlighting only the endpoint results from each deliverable. To learn about the steps it took to get to these results, we encourage you to navigate to the deliverable pages where in-depth documentation and visuals guide readers through meduCA’s story.
meduCA Mind Map
Starting at the beginning, our team began by taking a deep dive into researching the gaps present in both the mining industry and space economy as highlighted in our Needs Finding page.
The mining industry generates vast quantities of hazardous tailings that contaminate ecosystems with heavy metals and pose long-term environmental risks. Here in our home province of British Columbia (BC), the Mining and Mineral Extraction sector is highly prevalent as a source of income. As Canada’s largest producer of copper, mine tailings continue to pile up with no strong means of remediation in place. Current remediation methods are costly, resource-intensive, and often fail to provide sustainable solutions. Meanwhile, the rapidly expanding space economy faces a critical barrier: the absence of scalable, self-sustaining infrastructure to support long-term extraterrestrial missions. Construction in space remains heavily dependent on transporting materials from Earth, which is prohibitively expensive and impractical for large-scale projects.
As our market was researched, we also aimed to have meaningful conversations with the various populations and communities who may be affected by our technology. These Inclusive Perspectives ensured that many voices were heard, welcoming non-Synthetic Biology audiences to share their thoughts on our work and main ambitions.
This is where our community integration came into play. As we resonated with the local bioremediation challenge in BC and investigated the Market Research, it was important that our Human Practices efforts in both Education and Inclusivity made Synthetic Biology accessible for all. Our team worked hard to deliver custom educational programming to children and high school students to help them understand the topics covered in meduCA and see that there are alternative, sustainable solutions to the local challenges that surround us. From the inclusivity side, our team valued working towards a project that made science and engineering a comfortable and inclusive experience for all which is why we developed a stakeholder-specific musculoskeletal (MSK) tool. This inclusive lab project offers a comfortable attachment to reduce strain on an injured wrist, all while integrating Human Practices feedback and many iterations of the DBTL cycle as highlighting in our Engineering Success.
Community Integration
Inclusivity
Our final results were the creation of different MSK tools of differing sizes that are available on our GitLab. Our user expressed interest and enjoyment in our tool, and the final product exactly targeted her needs. When having other’s examine the tool, they also enjoyed it’s use.
The two marks are the two that contain the optimal or close to the optimal handle diameter, which is 51 mm and 58 mm, our print has 59 mm. They also are two of the prints that contain ribbing for extra grip.
Although there is future testing to be performed, we will be giving the tool to our user after the competition for her own use, and aim to get feedback from her during a longitudinal period of time, then make modifications as she needs. As well, we hope the result of our project also leads more teams to consider performing a project using an inclusive design framework which we followed and further documented in our Best Practices for Inclusive Design Project page.
Education
To foster a public understanding of synthetic biology, we aimed to promote active participation and engagement with bioengineering and the life sciences. The results of performing our three “E” (Expand, Explore, Engineer), was the creation a synthetic biology children’s storybook, and the UBC iGEM 2025 Synbio Case Competition. The synthetic biology children’s storybook led to the development of a 37 page storybook for children aged 5 to 8. We got feedback that it was highly enjoyed by the 9 year old sibling of one of our members. For iGEM 2025 Synbio Case Competition, 40 high school students of many different high schools participated in 3 different work shops, a lab tour, and performed a synthetic biology case competition. The event had a massively positive response, where 100% of students felt “more motivated to engage with synthetic biology research.”
Earth Application
What is our main goal here on Earth and how did we set out to reach it?
meduCA’s primary goal on Earth is to reduce the environmental and human health risks posed by mine tailings by stabilizing tailings beds and suppressing dust and leachate through biocementation. Stabilizing tailings reduces fugitive dust (airborne particulate that spreads contaminants) and limits the release of soluble metals into nearby waterways, protecting local communities and ecosystems.
As highlighted in the project mind map, the Strategic Planning took place to design business models aimed at analyzing strengths and weaknesses of the project as well as defining the products that we hope to share in the mining market landscape.
Strategic planning defines how meduCA grows as a self-sustaining venture. We have established the foundations of our business model, identified the opportunities and challenges that shape our industry, and implemented the systems needed to manage risks and maintain long-term adoption. Our commercialization pathway and intellectual property protections ensure that every stage of development is guided by a clear structure, allowing meduCA to scale while providing significant impact on Earth and in space.
Following our planning, meduCA’s technical brainstorming began. The first step in the pipeline was to select the Carbonic Anhydrase (CA) variants we would need to express in our microbes to employ the microbially induced calcium-carbonate precipitation (MICP) pathway, the key to biocementation. MICP has been widely studied as a method for soil and tailing solidification and dust-erosion reduction. Reviews and field studies show MICP can increase surface strength and reduce wind erosion and leaching risks ([1], [2], [3]). To support our team’s wet lab through Bioinformatics, we investigated the evolutionary landscape and biochemical properties of CAs. Our goal was to identify and characterize a diverse number of CA variants in order to optimally select one for both terrestrial and extraterrestrial conditions. We conducted phylogenetic analysis using TreeSAPP on the alpha family and traced sequence motifs and functional divergence across variants that had high catalytic performances. This integrative approached allowed us to provide wet lab with crucial information for further testing.
From the Modelling side, to assist Wet Lab in selecting candidates for surface display, AlphaFold was used to generate 3D models of the fusion proteins. Structural alignment on PyMOL allowed for the investigation of conformational changes. Finally, the stability of the proteins were analyzed through molecular dynamics simulations with GROMACS.
What about our microbe?
The composition of waste material (tailings) produced from mines depends on the type of ore being extracted, but generally consists of a mix of residual minerals and chemical byproducts that leach into the soil, and consequently the surrounding environment[4]. Although the application of biocementation is a viable and sustainable remediation approach, few microbes can survive in these locations and existing studies have limited information on the practical implementation of this strategy. Some studies suggest the use of immobilized carbonic anhydrase (CA) to cement tailings, particularly through enzymatic display, which has emerged as a promising waste remediation platform[5]. While there are many bacterial candidates that can support whole cell enzymatic display, our project targets Caulobacter crescentus due to its ability to tolerant harsh living conditions and its robust surface display system[6].
We designed a construct to display heterologous proteins, with a focus on carbonic anhydrases, on the S-layer of Caulobacter crescentus CB2A JS4038. This construct enables Caulobacter to generate calcium carbonate precipitates which crystallize between particles, such as sand, soil or regolith, binding them together into a solid mass and forming a natural cement.
We were able to assemble this construct and transform it into Caulobacter , and validate successful plasmid uptake through colony PCR. We discovered interesting properties of the cloned cells harbouring the surface display vector, in particular, a longer recovery time compared to our secretion and intracellular strains. Additionally, the limited culture growth of transformed surface display strains made it difficult to obtain enough plasmid for sequencing. Nevertheless, we established protocols and documented our work to help other iGEM teams and researchers exploring the bioremediation field.
We were able to clone this vector, insert BtCAII and electroporate it into CB2A. After over 6 days, we observed colonies on the transformed plates. We validated uptake of the display construct via colony PCR and got one colony that exhibited a band around ~ 800 bp, the expected size of the CA.
We grew up this culture, performed S-layer extraction and ran the samples on SDS-PAGE to visualize the protein weight. We observed faint band corresponding to the fusion protein (RsaA-BtCAII), which was higher than the positive control (just RsaA), leading us to believe that the bacteria successfully expressed the fusion protein. However the concentration may have been too low, so further protein expression optimization is needed.
This figure shows the SDS-PAGE analysis of protein extracts from the display and secretion CB2A strains. Lane 10 shows bands between 100 and 150 kDa, consistent with the expected size of RsaA–BtCAII (~130 kDa).
How can we optimize our biocementing bacteria’s growth to promote high-throughput biocementation in a mining setting?
The hardware team produced an optimized bioreactor for the Caulobacter crescentus CB2A strain exploring how agitation methods can better improve our biocementing bacteria’s growth. CB2A produces a biofilm that gives it significantly more surface adhesion that can impact cellular growth. By experimenting with different agitation methods, we can determine which agitation method is best optimized for reducing shear stress and biofilm production, key factors in cellular growth. Our bioreactor was found to have improved growth conditions in the early stages of the experiment, but plateaued soon after due to the agitation motor overheating. This result, while not conclusive, shows promising results for axial impeller agitation to optimize CB2A growth.
This figure shows the resulting experimental growth curve of bacteria, measured using OD.
The bioreactor has remote capabilities and can provide live temperature readings while recording the data on a sheet at 1 Hz that can be stored on the server. This will help support users to troubleshoot potential errors in experiments and support experimental results. The increased automation in our bioreactor is a significant step towards high-throughput bacterial growth.
What are the next steps for our Earth Application?
As an immediate next step, we will carry on with of our successful transformed strains, to verify protein expression and functionality. Our long term steps to implement the Earth application of meduCA are as follows:
Site Characterization and Lab Screening
We will collect representative tailings samples from target sites in British Columbia and characterize grain size, mineralogy, pH, native microbial community, and soluble metal content. Each tailings deposit is unique; our lab screening will determine whether CB2A-driven MICP is appropriate and what amendments are required such as calcium source and nutrient formulation. Lab-based MICP assays will be used to identify optimal dosing rates and reaction kinetics for that site ([7], [8]).
Formulation and Delivery System via a Spray Applicator
Following site optimization, we will scale CB2A into a field-ready formulation and apply it with a spray applicator tuned for tailing beds which we aim to develop in-house. Field-scale MICP projects commonly use surface spraying, grouting, or sequential infiltration to induce calcite precipitation. Spraying is suitable for thin, loose tailings covers and for minimizing heavy equipment on-site. Our design will aim to emphasize modular, low-footprint sprayers to minimize disturbance and allow repeated applications for uniform cementation.
Pilot Deployment and Monitoring
Once we prepare our formulation and spray technology, we will run controlled pilot plots to measure surface strength, reduction in wind-entrained dust, leachate composition, and durability in rain and freezing conditions. We will also verify calcium-carbonate precipitation and mineral binding using imaging and standard electron microscopy. Based on the results, we will iteratively adjust formulation and dosing based on monitored performance. [1]
Environmental and Regulatory Risk Assessment
Finally, we will ensure that our solution meets local environmental and regulatory approval by performing leachability testing, ecotoxicology screening, and evaluate the fate of our introduced cells and enzymes. Where live microbes are used, our team will ensure to adopt containment strategies, kill-switch or non-persistent formulations and coordinate with regulators and stakeholders before field trials.
Space Application
To segue into our goals for space, meduCA’s Mars goal is to enable in situ production of construction materials from local resources, namely martian regolith and the CO₂-rich atmosphere, to support habitat and infrastructure construction while minimizing mass launched from Earth. This reduces mission cost and environmental impact and advances a long-term strategy for sustainable off-world habitats. Materials are needed to protect technology like rovers from the radiation, winds, and dust storms on planets like Mars. We aimed to create self-healing bricks suitable for a Martian environment by enabling the in-situ bioprinting of biomaterials containing engineered Synechococcus elongatus UTEX 2973 using our in-house bioprinter. Through the MICP pathway, the extruded scaffolds will form calcite and cement the alginate-based biomaterial containing Martian Regolith to self-mineralize into bricks. This will allow for scalable, cost-effective, and in-situ construction using living building materials on Mars.
Why Mars?
Mars is a high-priority target for near-term human exploration and settlement; its thin CO₂ atmosphere and abundant regolith make it a plausible site for CO₂-driven MICP-based approaches. Choosing Mars allowed meduCA to design for realistic resource constraints and to align our technology with ISRU (in-situ resource utilization) goals.
We designed a modular construct to display carbonic anhydrases and other heterologous proteins on the S-layer of Synechococcus elongatus UTEX 2973. We used a vector to integrate the fusion protein sequence at its wild-type locus in the genome, which we call pRepv3. The construct enables this cyanobacterium to be an enhanced biocementer in our bioink formulation.
We were able to clone this vector, and validated it by Esp3I (linearization) and SapI (assembly) digest. We were able to insert HpCA into this vector, having confirmed it by PCR and EcoRI digest. At the time of writing, we had electroporated the construct into UTEX and recovered colonies, but had not yet validated by colony PCR.
We concluded that we could not obtain other inserted CA constructs because of competent cell issues, not because of an issue with the vector itself.
How can we optimize our biocementing bacteria’s growth to promote high-throughput biocementation in a Martian setting?
For increasing throughput on bacterial growth, we built a bioreactor to explore Synechoccocus elongatus UTEX 2973 and its growth factor of light. To do this, we experimented with different light types and tried to optimize it for bacterial growth. A feature of this bioreactor that could significantly improve growth is it’s ability to provide subsurface aeration via gas-liquid diffusion. Traditional wet lab culture flasks do not have the ability to aerate besides increasing the gas-liquid diffusion rate via gradient.
This figure shows the exponential phase of the UTEX growth curve and its plateau.
The growth curve experiment done on Mark 2 reached exponential phase significantly earlier than wet lab. This suggests that the presence of red or long wavelengths of visible light or improved aeration supplemented the growth of cyanobacteria. While this suggests improved growth for future high-throughput experiments, our iHP contact Matt Heron raised the issue of even lighting throughout the culture. As the culture volume increases, the surface area to volume ratio decreases, making it difficult to evenly distribute lighting throughout the vessel. Based on experimental results in this growth curve, a future improvement could be implementing lights within the culture volume.
We used Flux Balance Analysis (FBA) to further optimize media and culture conditions using Synechococcus elongatus UTEX 2973’s Genome Scale Metabolic Model. We plotted phenotypic phase planes and conducted Flux Variability Analysis to test CO₂ dependence, carbon source preference, nutrient limitations, and oxygen-related knockouts to optimize UTEX 2973 as a strain suitable for Mars. We validated the oxygen transport and oxygen exchange reaction knockouts in UTEX 2973 by culturing them in an anerobic chamber. We showed that UTEX 2973 is still capable of growing without environmental oxygen but non-ideal as exponential growth was delayed and slow compared to regular culture in an oxygenated, light incubator. Future directions will be validating the FBA modelling outputs using an automated, high throughput lighting system capable of screening many culture conditions at parallel using a Design of Experiments approach.
Single reaction knockout analysis on oxygen exchange and oxygen transport, showing that objective value of UTEX 2973 biomass decreases by half. The growth curve shows a long lag phase, where the slope of the anaerobic condition is significantly lower than aerobic conditions, until it jumped into exponential growth between days 2 and 4.
To prevent forward contamination and to protect experiments, meduCA would operate inside a sealed, controlled “contained biomanufacturing module” (CBM), a small habitat or laboratory designed for closed-loop handling of microbes, fluids, and waste, with HEPA/filtration, sterilization workflows, and controlled effluent handling. This approach aligns with COSPAR and NASA planetary protection requirements, which mandate sterilization and containment strategies for biological experiments on Mars. Planning must account for certification, verification, and containment throughout operations.
Water Sourcing & Processing
Water is required to culture microbes and carry out MICP chemistry. Mars contains water primarily as ice (polar caps, mid-latitude ground ice) and likely large amounts of subsurface ice and groundwater reservoirs at depth; remote sensing and in-situ missions indicate substantial ice deposits and, in some studies, deep liquid reservoirs. Realistic ISRU strategies include: mining shallow ice or near-surface ice, extracting bound water in regolith (heating/desublimation), or capturing atmospheric water via condensation technologies ([9]).
Bioprinter
The biomaterials team tested a novel bioink composition consisting of sodium alginate, carboxy methylcellulose, and Martian Regolith Simulant. Through qualitative observations, we determined an operable range of weight % for each component in the Martian Simulant alginate gel, including whether crosslinking in calcium chloride was necessary or not. We finalized a Martian Simulant alginate gel that can hold multiple layers and be extruded without clogging a syringe.
Martian Regolith Simulant alginate gels containing 20 weight % Martian Regolith Simulant, 3 weight % sodium alginate, and 3.5 weight % carboxymethylcellulose. Three shapes were extruded manually and these scaffolds were not submerged in calcium chloride solution.
We also computationally modelled the crosslinking of sodium alginate when exposed to calcium chloride within our bioink samples using coupling differential equations to simulate calcium diffusion and crosslinking. Through experimentally crosslinking earth sand and martian alginate gels with calcium chloride for different times, we could calibrate our computational model to the experimental data.
Absorbed volume of calcium chloride results for alginate only (0% sand), 9 wt% carboxy methylcellulose + 30 wt% earth sand alginate gel, and 3.5 wt% methylcellulose + 20 wt% MGS-1 alginate gel. The black dots represent experimentally obtained data fitted to the model.
The hardware team modified the TronXY Moore 1 printer to use as our in-house bioprinter to automate the extrusion of our finalized bioink.
CAD Mockup of TronXY Moore 1 printer with planned modifications of syringe pump and bioink reservoir.
We were able to test 3 weight % alginate + 9 weight % carboxy methylcellulose, 30 weight % Earth Construction Sand + 9 weight % carboxy methylcelullose + 3 weight % alginate, and 20 weight % Martian Regolith Simulant + 3.5 weight % carboxy methylcellulose + 3 weight % alginate in the TronXY Moore 1 printer through its manual extrusion mechanism. All three gels were consistently extruded through the nozzle of the printer and can be successfully crosslinked with calcium chloride for solidification.
Gel scaffolds extruded by the TronXY Moore 1 printer. Green scaffolds contain Earth Construction Sand, white scaffolds contain no sand, and red scaffolds contain Martian Regolith Simulant.
Moving forward, the biomaterials team hopes to use Design of Experiments to optimize their bioink composition for maximizing UTEX 2973 viability. This will involve developing a protocol to incorporate microbes into the gel and determine its viability through live-dead assays. We incorporated commercial carbonic anhydrase into the gels, but we hope to incorporate our engineered stain containing surface displayed carbonic anhydrase into the bioink, and conducting compression tests and/or scanning electron microscopy to confirm calcite formation. Our hardware team will also hope to move away from modifying existing printers to building our own DIY bioprinter using cost-effective and sustainable materials.
What are the next steps?
Assay Development
The next phase of our wet lab work focuses on executing and validating the assays outlined in Functional Validation. We will begin by performing surface display verification across E. coli, Caulobacter, and Synechococcus to confirm extracellular exposure of CA fusion proteins using cell fractionation, trypsin accessibility, and immunoblotting.
Following surface display confirmation, we will conduct functional assays, including ones to quantify CA catalytic activity under varying pH and temperature conditions. Parallel calcium depletion and gravimetric assays will then establish the relationship between enzymatic activity and calcium carbonate precipitation efficiency.
Finally, optimized conditions from these assays will be used to correlate CA surface display with MICP performance, providing a complete link between molecular-level enzyme validation and biocementation outcomes.
Low Gravity Simulator
The purpose of the low gravity simulator was to model and experimentally assess if there were any impacts of low gravity on bacterial growth. Unfortunately, it did not reach bacterial validation stages due to time constraints. Qualitative validation will be done followed by qualitative results using an accelerometer to graph forces and acceleration felt by bacteria in the vessel. Assuming the results reflect a low-gravity environment as shown in our literature reviews, we would insert bacteria into the vessel and conduct a growth curve experiment. Based on the results of that experiment, we could conclude or explore how low gravity would affect bacterial growth on Martian and space environments. Further steps would include exploring the relationship between motor RPM and acceleration/gravity experienced by bacteria in the vessel. This data could be used to optimize the simulator to reflect specific gravities or other environments with varying forces.
What is our proposed workflow?
Once we get to Mars, our proposed process flow is as follows:
Harvest Resources: this includes extracting martian regolith and water on site
Containment and feedstock preparation: transfer regolith into sealed reaction chambers and add controlled UTEX/CA formulations as well as a calcium source. Calcium may be provided from local minerals or will likely be carried minimally as a concentrated payload depending on site composition. An evaluation of the site will require geochemical surveying
Biocementation reaction: run MICP in controlled vessels via our in-house bioink & bioprinter design. The modular bioprinter will allow us to deposit our cells and ink as needed. Cured bricks will eventually choke out living microbes due to the formation of calcite crystals
Sterilization & Waste Handling: all used fluids, startup cultures, and extra biomass are sterilized and sequestered to prevent escape into the Martian environment
meduCA stands at the intersection of planetary stewardship and space innovation. By transforming CO₂ and mineral waste into sustainable living building materials (LBMs), UBC Vancouver is reimagining construction both on Earth and beyond. On our planet, meduCA offers a way to stabilize toxic mine tailings and reduce industrial emissions. On Mars, it provides the foundation for self-sufficient habitats built from local resources.
From the ground beneath our feet to the regolith of distant worlds, meduCA proves that the same biology that sustains life on Earth can also build the future among the stars.
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