The 1^st Microbial Petri Dish Art Design Competition in Hubei Province came to an end. In the five-month competition, 544 teams from 22 universities in Hubei Province submitted their 839 entries. After preliminary and final evaluations, expert committee awarded 3 first prizes, 8 second prizes, 14 third prizes and 90 honorable mentions.

Co-hosted by Hubei Association For Science and Technology and HZAU, the competition was organized simultaneously by National Popular Science Base of Agricultural Life Science and Technology in HZAU with the theme of “Explore the ‘micro’ beauty: A Youthful Tribute to The 20^th CPC National Congress”. By advocating students to paint with microorganisms, the activity focuses on picturing diverse “micro” world to promote the integration of science, humanity and art, develop students’ aesthetic value and arouse students’ interest in life science studies.

Micro Dance

Among entries awarded with first prizes, Micro Dance, under the guidance of Associate Professor Hu Sishun from HZAU, contains creative elements like dragon dance, lion dance and Peking Opera to demonstrate the combination of traditional art and life. Additionally, this work shows the beauty of life with the growth of microorganism. Participants used sterile pipette tips as the paintbrush, Serratia marcescens, Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus as pigments to complete this work on LB Culture.

Double Flying

Carrying on “Changing and Unchanging” concept, Double Flying was inspired by ancient apsaras and modern flying spacecraft and the evolution of Chinese characters, conveying the idea of “Unchanged one embraces changes and then changes lead to realization of dreams”. With sterile fine brush as the paintbrush, and Serratia marcescens, red Saccharomyces, white Saccharomyces and Penicillium as pigments, students gradually created this work on PDA Culture according to characteristics of different strains. This creative work was guided by Liu Yan and Liu Li from HZAU.

The Little Mermaid

Drawing inspirations from The Little Mermaid, the work The Little Mermaid created by Huazhong University of Science and Technology combines fairy tale and microorganism together. Thanks to the effects that hydrogen peroxide produces oxygen through catalase interaction with Escherichia coli, this work shows the beauty of a little mermaid in pursuit of love and happiness, who eventually changes into foams. Students used modified inoculating loop as a paintbrush, Escherichia coli, Kocuria rhizophlia, rhodobacterium and yeast as pigments to create this work on Symbiotic Culture of bacteria and yeast.

Huazhong University of Science and Technology and other 7 universities won the title of “Excellent Organizational Unit”. Bai Hong, together with other 31 teachers was awarded with the honorary title of “Excellent Guide Teacher”.

List of Winners

1.The first prize (3)

2. The second prize (8)

3. The third prize (14)

Source: http://news.hzau.edu.cn/2022/1208/65330.shtml

Translated by: Liu Bangyan

Supervised by: Jin Bei