Catalog of Projects
A list of current and past Agara projects!
Community Projects
Open Insulin
Open Insulin is a team of biohackers from various cities and backgrounds working to develop the first practical, small-scale, community-centered model for insulin production to make insulin accessible to all. They hope to contribute to a world in which communities in need have local sources of safe, affordable, high-quality insulin, and where people living with diabetes and their communities can own and govern the organizations that produce the medicine they depend on to survive.
More Information: https://openinsulin.org
Open Insulin Sub-projects:
Antibody Project
We are exploring the feasibility of producing and purifying home-made antibodies against Insulin!
More Information: Join the #openinsulinproject channel on Slack and ask!
Recruitment Status: New recruits welcome!
Contact Info: Justin Greene, jgree157@jhu.edu
Camel Micelle Project
We are studying how insulin behaves with the camel micelle, possibly as means of transport.
Recruitment Status: New recruits welcome!
Contact Info: Gil Berreby, gberreb1@jhu.edu
Yeast Protein Expression Literature Review
We are investigating ways to potentially increase protein expression levels in Pichia pastoris by reviewing scientific literature and compiling our findings.
Recruitment Status: New recruits welcome!
Contact Info: Tony Yao, tyao4@jhu.edu
iGEM
The International Genetically Engineered Machine competition (iGEM), is an annual competition aimed at pushing the boundaries of synthetic biology to solve global issues.
The Johns Hopkins iGEM team is supported by Agara Bio, and is working hard to sweep the competition at iGEM 2021!
More Information: https://igem.org/Main_Page
Recruitment Status: Not Recruiting (Recruits in the Fall Semester)
Contact Info: Sreenivas Eadara, seadara1@jhu.edu
Integrated Projects
Project GRFT
We have evidence of a powerful anti-viral biologic that has been shown to be effective against coronaviruses and other enveloped viruses in animal models. We are forming a team to license it, biomanufacture and deploy it globally via expression within genetically engineered rice. Our work is multidisciplinary, including genetics, plant cell culture, hardware development, and legal.
The purpose of this work is to provide a material means to protect all people worldwide from coronaviruses, other enveloped viruses that are inhibited by GRFT and from emerging viruses.
Recruitment Status: Recruits welcome!
Contact Info: Sreenivas Eadara, seadara1@jhu.edu
Independent Projects
David's Project
David Lu is testing the binding affinities of aptamers to the platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF) protein as a model. Results will inform future experiments involving interactions of aptamers and aptamer binding.
Recruitment Status: Not recruiting