iGEM Team Brings Back Gold Medal from Paris

At William & Mary, innovation often springs from collaboration, and nowhere is that more evident than with the iGEM team.

This year, a small but determined group of six undergraduates represented W&M at the International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition in Paris, earning a gold medal for their project Aquarius, which harnessed the power of synthetic biology to tackle pressing water-related environmental challenges.

What is iGEM?

iGEM is the world’s largest synthetic biology organization and student competition. Each year, collegiate and high school teams design, build, and test biological systems using DNA-based “parts” to solve real-world problems. Teams then present their work to international judges and peers at the annual Jamboree held in Paris.

Almost 7,000 students from over 50 countries competed this year. 

A Small but Mighty Team

This year’s W&M team was made up of seniors Rebecca Zheleznyak, Xinyu Hu, and Vandana Kalithkar, juniors Olabisi Bashorun and Sean Emmett, and sophomore Madeline Eibner-Gebhardt. The team of six (and one student advisor) was the fewest in the ten years W&M has competed in iGEM and the smallest of the 421 high school and undergraduate teams in this year’s competition.

Faculty advisor Margaret Saha, a Chancellor Professor in Applied Science, said a small team meant the students had to produce not only lab research, but also software, mathematical models, public education materials, safety documentation, and web-based project wikis that detail every stage of their work.

“There were no benefits to being small,” Saha said with a laugh. “It was an extraordinary challenge, but the students were beyond fantastic – they worked longer, harder, more efficiently, and above all, smarter than ever before.”

Zheleznyak was on last year’s iGEM team that had ten students. She said less people meant more responsibilities, particularly on meeting tight submission deadlines for deliverables like the videos and wiki.

“Some teams have people who are dedicated to doing those deliverables and then other people on the team who do the science, but for us we each had to do everything and help however we could,” said Zheleznyak. “We were all just working so closely together in such a small group that each person put everything into it, and that was really incredible to watch.”

Project Aquarius: Engineering Solutions for Water

Adding to the difficulty was the ambitious project the team decided to take on this year, Aquarius, which focused on using synthetic biology to address water-related environmental issues like harmful algal blooms and corrosion to bacterial contamination in aging infrastructure.

“We wanted to incorporate something that is personal to William and Mary and to us, and since this year was the “Year of the Environment”, we started thinking about it and realized that one of the four pillars of William & Mary’s [Vision 2026] is water,” explained Zheleznyak. “We wanted to center our project around how we can implement some bioengineered constructs in real-world aquatic environments.”

Emmett emphasized the importance of doing a project that had real-world implications.

“We wanted to make a project that we could see actually being implemented in the future or contributing to a better world in terms of safety or the economy or just public health.”

While the team started meeting in January, they didn’t start the wet lab portion of the project until the summer.

The students and Saha all mentioned how important the Charles Center was in providing each student with a summer stipend, either for honors thesis research for the seniors or summer research support for the other students.

“We could not have done this without the Charles Center,” stated Saha. “Their support was absolutely vital, and what's more exciting about this is that each of these students have a project going forward.”

Zheleznyak said she is integrating iGEM into her honors thesis, which is an opportunity to build off their work with the eventual goal of getting published.

“[iGEM] provides such a big opportunity for undergraduates to experience research firsthand, to think of a project, execute it, and then present it in front of so many people at the Jamboree,” said Zheleznyak. “To be able to create something from scratch that can actually contribute to the field as an undergraduate is an incredible opportunity upon itself, and I'm so glad that we have that at the school.”

While just a sophomore, Eibner-Gebhardt doesn’t think she will try to compete on next year’s team as she is eager to see her iGEM work to completion and publication.

“I have so much data I'd like to analyze from this year’s project,” explained Eibner-Gebhardt. “I don't want drop that, I want to keep going with what I have because I think there are so many cool topics that we can follow up on.”

Interdisciplinary at Its Core

Perhaps the most defining feature of W&M’s iGEM program is its interdisciplinary nature. The team draws on students from across fields, which this year included biology, computer science, data science, physics, neuroscience, and applied mathematics.

“I've always seen that iGEM has so many different majors in their members, so I joined because I love the interdisciplinary aspect of it,” said Bashorun. “It's just great that [iGEM] is right here in William & Mary, which was a drawing point to why I came here, opportunities like this for undergraduates to actually do research and science.”

Growing Reputation

W&M has earned an impressive track record since first competing in iGEM in 2014.

By Saha’s tally, based on how many times they have won, top 10 finishes and gold medals, William & Mary has been among the most successful iGEM teams from the U.S. over the past decade.

That reputation precedes them – even abroad.

“One woman approached us and said, ‘oh you're William & Mary’, like she expected a lot from us, so yeah I think we do have a bit of a reputation now after the past few years, but I think that's a good thing,” said Eibner-Gebhardt.

“We had people come up to us in Paris saying they modeled their website on ours from last year,” added Zheleznyak. “It was surreal to see how well-known the William & Mary iGEM team is internationally.”

So what makes William & Mary students so successful at iGEM?

Saha points to a combination of things.

“Students who are creative and who are able to look beyond the boundary of a narrow discipline,” said Saha. “They want to make things and really solve local problems that have global implications.”

Looking Ahead

With this year’s competition complete, Saha is now looking to form a team to compete in 2026, with an information session for interested students on Nov. 19 at 7pm in ISC 0280.

Why should students consider iGEM?

“It’s risky. It solves problems in a completely novel way, integrating wet lab, AI, modeling and engineering, and to me it is at the cutting-edge of science and really pushes boundaries in ways that no other field that I've been associated with does,” answered Saha. “It is the most creative of all human activities – making things to improve people's lives.”