UGENE for Genetic Engineering Education

The wonderful project "Genetic Engineering in Schools", spearheaded by biologists and bio-entrepreneurs from Novosibirsk Akademgorodok, recently launched a series of webinars for students and teachers. These webinars explain, in simple terms and with numerous visuals, photos, and videos, how to learn to design artificial bacteria: which enzymes to cut them with, how to separate and join DNA fragments, and how to amplify their quantity.

The training includes elements of real laboratory work ("wet" biology) as well as computer modeling and representation ( bioinformatics). It also teaches participants how to conduct their own genetic engineering events.

As one of the lecturers remarked: "We live in a different time! What used to take good labs years, twenty years ago, can now be done by a student in a computer in 1 to 1.5 hours, or by an experienced researcher in just a few minutes."

We are delighted that our bioinformatics software package, UGENE, played a significant role in supporting this initiative and the preparation of the webinars, helping to illustrate the key stages of computer work in genetic engineering.

Our collaboration will continue, and we hope the number of young people passionate about genetic engineering will keep growing both in Russia and around the world.