Draft-Final Project Ideas

James Utley, Panama City, Panama — SynBio USFQ Node

IDEA 1 — MSC-Based Biological Enhancement for Radiation Exposure

Leveraging MSCs for Enhanced Radiation Resistance

Molecular Dynamics Simulation Engine (Rust, ~80% complete) — GPU-accelerated molecular simulation for radiation damage studies, focused on EC-SOD protection in space environments.
Molecular Visualization Engine (Rust, ~50% complete) — High-performance Rust-based visualization for Molecular Dynamics simulations.
Design microfluidics validation proxy via remote microfluidics system.
Compare results — gain insights.

References: DOI: 10.2514/6.2025-4115 | GitHub

IDEA 2 — PRODNB: Turn Protein Structures into Drum & Bass

Structural biology meets hardcore electronic music — “Where Protein Topology Becomes the Drop”

Pipeline: PDB (protein structure) → Graph Neural Network → Drum & Bass Generator

Features: TUI Music Player • MIDI Output • Machine Learning

ProDnB WebUI

Workflow: (1) Upload PDB file → (2) Generate Strudel Code (via Groq’s Compound AI) → (3) Copy to Strudel. The WebUI parses PDB files (chains, residues, atoms) and outputs Strudel live-coding patterns for drum & bass.

IDEA 3 — BioVolt: DIY Electroporator Validation

Efficiency and frugal validation of a piezoelectric electroporator

Create a piezoelectric electroporator from a barbecue lighter and validate its functionality through a complete workflow. Triangulate multiple data points — plasmid amplification, colorimetric/UV measurement, transformation plating, and post-transformation PCR — to confirm efficacy and provide credible, frugal, end-to-end validation of a DIY electroporation workflow.

Video: DEF CON 32 — You got a lighter I need to do some Electroporation