First day in lab

Today in lab I was allowed in a literature review meeting.  In this meeting a student presented a paper on retinal basal membrane extra cellular matrix proteins.  The PI and every one in lab analyzed the paper in order to better to understand the science.  My mentor took me to see the x ray photoelectron spectroscopy machine.  This machine sends a beam of light to a sample.  He would like to send this beam at different angles to get a better picture of what is on the cover slips.

Summer camp over

All the high school students had a great time.  They got to present what they learned for the week.  The students also left with a desire to know more about science.  It was a great experience.

DNA demo

The students were excited today to see their results from the plasmid extraction.  The students ran their gels and got to see how good their lab techniques were.

NSF REU Seminar

Dr. Mikos presented today tissue engineering.  He stated that his work is designed to create tissue that ultimately be used for patient with severe trauma, and to be used after tumor removal.  Creating polymer scaffolding for cell growth is an intricate process. The polymer itself needs to maintain the mechanical properties of the tissue it is replacing.  Dr. Mikos use the example of elasticity and arteries.  If the polymer you are creating does not have this property it will not function as an artery.  He also mentioned that the FDA for the most part does not band material used in engineered products but products themselves.  The process of making the polymer may leave harmful solvents in the product and that is what the FDA monitors.  Dr. Mikos lecture was every interesting and had the REU talking about taking his classes.  

Communication Workshop

Today the students dove into writing their college essays. They were given some homework. They are to complete their drafts so they can do peer review on the last day. Dr. Messmer gave them some advice. That it is better to have more material and then cut down. He also talked about conclusions. He stated that you do not need to restate you thesis and it can be only a sentence.

Ethics Training

For lunch I had ethics training. I was given 2 articles to read for the seminar. The first article was very detailed, and was about graduate students reporting their mentor for falsifying data. The article interviewed the students and you got a sense of conflict. The students were face with doing nothing or facing the consequences of doing the right thing. It is interesting to see that even when you do what is right it can still make matters difficult. Most students had to start over or get out of science all together. Some were glad to have that piece of mind and others were still conflicted. They all knew they did what was right but some still did not understand what they got out of it.


The second article was not as detailed and just was information about retractions. The researcher in a lab falsified data and was forced to print retractions. It was discovered that these falsifications were going on for quite some time, and many retraction were printed. It was determined that the retractions did not alter our understanding immunology.

The seminar also had a presentation for different faculty from Rice. They explained what scientific misconduct was and our responsibility of researchers to do good science. If anything were to happen just tell someone. If something did not work, just report it. If mistakes are made just let people know.

Microscopy Demo

The group went into Dr. Caprette’s lab. Here we looked at microscopic specimens. The students examined pond water and a culture of protist. I learned a new technique to use in class. Yeast can be grown and then treated with Congo red. Once the dye has been incorporated into the yeast it can be heat treated and stored. The yeast can be feed to a live culture of protist. The protist will then digest the yeast, and while looking through a microscope the students can see a color change occur. The yeast changes from red to purple when digested.