REU DR. Read’s lab This week I successfully extracted genomic DNA and RNA from the cultures I grew up in the past two weeks. There are some practical goals in my research project. One is performing all the processes of DNA and RNA extraction sterilely to avoid any contaminations. The second one is extracting genomic DNA. To do so, DNA should not be sheared in anyway. With that being said I was not able to use pipetting methods to transfer my DNA content which can be challenging sometimes. Also, I had to use a new method to pellet the algae instead of centrifuging it. This week, Dr. Read; my mentor, decided to use a filtration method instead of spinning the cells. It was meow first-time using filtration method to get the cells out of their cultures. Although it took about two hours to filter all the cells, I am so happy that the method worked and I could extract the DNA and RNA from my samples. The ultimate goal of this project I am working on is to understand the algae’s characteristics in genomic level. I also started to help Dr. Read with another project which I found very interesting. I started to inject gas chromatography and mass spectrometry samples in GC-MS machine. The samples are from different specious such as Emiliania huxleyi. In this project we would like to identify the components of Emiliania huxleyi’s lipids at a molecular level. I started to learn how to work with the machine and the software program which is being used to operate the machine. I would like to thank my great mentor Dr. Read for conveying her expertise to me passionately and being willing to teach and help all the time. Bioinformatics In our Wednesday bioinformatic meeting I learn a lot in many ways. This week we started to use new tools in Kbase website such as Kaijo. We also started to analyze the FASTQC results from the previous weeks. I believe our bioinformatic meetings are very important for one main reason and that is the necessity of bioinformatics in our filed of work. We pretty much know how to practically generate the data that we think can be helpful for our research project. However, understanding the generated data and making biological sense out of them is what bioinformatics does, and it can be quite challenging. This week we have to analyze some of the generated data with different tools in Kbase website and present them in our next week bioinformatics meeting. Next week I will run agarose gels for my extracted DNA and RNA and I can’t wait to see what the results are. I am also looking forward to present the table that we generated for results section of our manuscript in our bioinformatics meeting. Activities Beside work which was so exciting, I had a great week in terms of the fun activities that we all did. First of all, I celebrated my birthday with my REU colleagues at our pool. It was a great party and we all enjoyed the pool in on a sunny Saturday. Before that some of my REU friends distracted me for a day to arrange a surprise birthday which they did a great job doing that. In the middle of the week I got a chance to visit Thermo Fisher’s Carlsbad site for the second time. This time I went with a group of CSUSM students who are mostly looking for job immidiently or sometime soon. It was great meeting both graduated and senior peers in a different setting than collage. Next week are going to a field trip to Anza-Borrego desert state park, which I’ve been waiting for a long time.
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Watch this space for weekly updates!Every week, one of our CSUSM NSF REU students will post their blurb, summarizing their week, and chronicling our program. AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
August 2023
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