Unicamp has achieved international prominence in International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) 2025The largest synthetic biology competition in the world, held in October in Paris, was created at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). It was financially supported by... Vice-Rectorate for Extension, Sports and Culture (ProEEC)The team, coordinated by professors André Damasio and Elizabeth Bilsland, received a gold medal. It was among the top ten postgraduate projects and was also awarded the prize for best project in the world in the Food and Nutrition category. The group was also nominated in other special competitions, such as Best Video, Best Integrated Human Practices, and Best Entrepreneurship.
The iGEM, created in 2004, brings together teams from around the world and operates differently from traditional competitions. Medals are not awarded by comparing one team to another, but by fulfilling a series of tasks involving research, social impact, communication, ethics, modeling, and other criteria. According to Professor Elizabeth Bilsland, from the Institute of Biology (IB), "A large portion of the teams can't even meet the requirements for bronze. Reaching gold means combining science, technology, and social responsibility in a very mature way."
Unicamp had already participated in iGEM in 2009 and 2011, years in which it also won a gold medal, but it went more than a decade without competing. Since its resumption in 2022, students have created the Synthetic Biology League of the Institute of Biology, which today helps to organize and train new teams, ensuring the project's continuity. “The league helps maintain a memory and a knowledge base for new students. Before, each team that was formed started from scratch. Now, there is continuity,” the teacher highlighted.
The project presented this year, called PeccitrusIt was born from the students' own initiative and seeks to address a problem that directly affects the Brazilian economy: diseases that attack orange groves, especially the Greening (a disease that severely damages citrus farming), which has already compromised entire plantations in the state of São Paulo. Inspired by research on a defense peptide found in an amphibian from the Cerrado region, the students created ways to produce this molecule in the laboratory.
They also showed that the fungus can grow using waste from the orange industry, creating a sustainable process for the entire chain. "The students built production systems in different organisms and even managed to use the orange waste itself to generate a possible solution to the problem.""Elizabeth explained."
To better understand the needs of those who work with oranges, the team visited more than 90 places, including farms, industries, and laboratories. In addition to experiments, they created an "artificial nose" capable of detecting the disease directly on the plant's leaf, inspired by trained dogs that can identify contaminated trees by smell. The project involved students from biology, physics, economics, food engineering, and other fields, demonstrating the multidisciplinary nature of synthetic biology. "The team only works when all these areas communicate," commented the professor.
With its innovative approach, the Unicamp team ranked among the top ten in the world in the postgraduate category, out of 421 participating teams. All the visual material, including the official video, was produced by the students themselves. “It’s all their initiative. They create the visual identity, do the modeling, the hardware"The economic studies and the extension activities. We, the advisors, act more as mentors," Elizabeth stated proudly.
The impact of iGEM goes beyond the competition. The professor explains that participation in the championship often opens important doors for students, especially in postgraduate programs abroad. “When a student applies for a doctorate abroad, one of the first questions is whether they contributed to the team. Those who participate in iGEM demonstrate leadership, initiative, and work capacity.” Does this weigh too much."
