Àngela Vidal, to the IES Sant Agustí d'Eivissa.

Ángela Vidal Verdú and Paola Corbín Agustí, researchers at the Institute of Integrative Systems Biology (I2SysBio), a joint center of the University of Valencia (UV) and the Higher Council for Scientific Research (CSIC), have brought the microbial world closer to pre-university students in Ibiza within the Amgen program TransferCiència 2024, which has the objective of promoting learning and scientific vocations in biotechnology and genetics.

Thus, Àngela Vidal Verdú (doctoral researcher), has carried out the seminar “Life in plastic, it’s fantastic!” and the practical activity titled “Discovering microbial bioprospecting in the laboratory”, in which it has been revealed that plastic pollution is an environmental problem that already affects all ecosystems on the planet. Thus, the advantages and disadvantages of this essential material were discussed. "To provide solutions, biotechnology works on microbial bioremediation, that is, the study and use of microorganisms or their activities to degrade these contaminating compounds," explained Àngela Vidal. Roman",serif'>

In the workshop they learned what bioprospecting and microbial bioremediation are, and a practical activity was carried out where they discovered how to work with microorganisms in the microbiology laboratory. The different ways of cultivating microorganisms, the importance of maintaining sterility and how to identify which microorganisms have been isolated in the different culture media were also explained. style="text-align:justify">In addition, on the same Friday, March 15, Paola Corbín (doctoral researcher) brought a seminar to the IES Sa Colomina in Ibiza, “Microorganisms and the human being” and a practical activity titled “The race for the vaccine against red disease”, which addressed the microbial world and some of its curiosities, with a particular emphasis on bacteria and their relationship with the human being. human. Thus, the role of probiotics, beneficial bacteria for human health, has been delved deeper into, revealing the reasons why they are a central pillar in the context of scientific research at the University of Valencia.

In the second part, the students have become scientists in search of the design of an oral vaccine based on probiotics against the red disease disease. Through a hands-on approach, they have learned and applied essential procedures such as growing cultures in a Petri dish, understanding genetic modification, and performing an ELISA assay for the detection of an antigen. style="text-align:justify"> class="m15">Images:

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