International Biotechnology Congress at
Johanna-Wittum-School in Pforzheim
After starting the new project, “Microbiome Analysis” in Levoča, the Erasmus+ team, alongside participants from the USA, India, and China met again at Johanna-Wittum-Schule in Pforzheim to continue the investigation. The latest scientific results show that the gut microbiome is related to brain diseases like Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, or Dementia. Analyzing the microbiome in the gut could help find new treatments for these diseases.
In this meeting, the participants learned more about microbiome analysis by DNA sequencing.
The German hosts warmly welcomed students and teachers from the USA, India, China, France, Denmark, Slovakia, Greece, Poland, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Spain and Türkiye. Students from the USA, India, China and Spain experienced German culture firsthand by staying with local host families, which provided a unique experience.
From 12.01.2025 to 18.01.2025, the laboratory internship was instructed by an international mentor team, consisting of students from Germany, Lithuania and the Czech Republic.
The experiments for this meeting were focused on microbiome analysis by DNA-sequencing. Therefore, students isolated the skin microbiome of their right thumb and incubated it on nutrients in petri dishes overnight. The scientific question was: “Is the skin microbiome of the right thumb changing, depending on the global location of a person?”. Therefore, we prepared the skin microbiome prepared at home and compared it with the microbiome taken in Pforzheim.
Our hypothesis was that our skin microbiome will adapt to the local environment in a short time.
In the first step of the lab work, the students exercised precise pipetting. This was necessary to prevent future mistakes in the experiment. Each work group had to pipet the PCR components carefully into a tube with the isolated DNA out of the bacteria of the investigated microbiome.
PCR allows selective amplification of the 16S rRNA gene — a gene present in all bacteria, which later helped to identify the bacteria in their microbiome.
To evaluate the successful PCR of the 16s rRNA-gene, we did a gel-electrophoresis. Most of the teams did the PCR successfully because they had a band in the gel with the length of 1500 base pairs.
If the PCR was successful the next step was to purify the PCR product.
Next, they did DNA purification by solid phase reversed immobilization (SPRI). The SPRI purification method contains specific beads for taking out the PCR components rest of primers, Taq-Polymerase and nucleotides. This step was important so that only our gene of interest would be available in the approach of nanopore sequencing.
Before sequencing, participants learned how to prepare the MinKNOW program which regulates the tool of Oxford Nanopore Sequencing called MinION. Students inserted the Flongle Flow Cell into the MinION and primed the Flow Cell. To prepare the 16s rRNA-gene for sequencing they added the motorprotein and prepared the DNA-library, ready for sequencing.
Besides the practical execution of the experiments, background information about the experiments was presented by international mentor teams. The work groups also evaluated their results and presented them to the audience.
These presentations revealed significant differences between the skin microbiomes of Indian students taken in India and their samples taken in Germany, confirming the hypothesis of the skin microbiome changing dependent on the global location very quickly.
Other results: https://www.geneeditingbycrispr.com/2025/01/26/result-presentations-microbiome/
To figure out the best student out of all, the students were challenged in a multiple-choice exam at the end of the meeting. The top three participants received a project certificate, and the best student was given a special reward. Salomėja from Lithuania and Hanna from Slovakia were the best students of the mentor team. Additionally, David from the USA achieved the highest score out of the non-mentors.
Furthermore, the students could learn more about Pforzheim’s history and each other’s culture. During a cultural evening, each team had the opportunity to give a typical performance of their country. The fundamental part was to see how proud every student was to present a part of their life.
For example the team from Türkiye exercised a typical dance with all participants.
As part of the program, students gained an insight of the global active pharmaceutical company Roche in Mannheim and eight local companies in Pforzheim.
Everyone was welcomed by the mayor in the town hall, seeing Pforzheim’s joy in hosting this international event at the Johanna-Wittum-School. Furthermore, a historical tour through the city showed the Bertha-Benz memorial and the origin of jewelry industry in Pforzheim.
The highlight of the tour was the Gasometer, which was the precondition of the industrial revolution at the beginning of the 20th century. The inside of the museum is also an impressive art museum with a 360-degree panorama of the Amazonian rainforest in Brazil.
By the end of the meeting, all participants expressed their appreciation for the well-organized event and its welcoming atmosphere. The experience left a lasting impression, creating cherished memories for everyone involved.
A heartfelt thank you goes to our guests from all over the world.