Halleloo!

Please excuse my extended absence. Apparently, I'm not very good at keeping this updated when things are going at "bat-shit crazy" speed. Here's a brief recap of what's been going on in my life since February:

1. SOT was awesome! How great it is to see this expansive world of science and toxicology outside of this hole I live in, here in the lab. It is so easy to forget why I am putting myself through all this; seeing all this other research and successful professionals really excites me. I was totally nerding out over things like new methodology and mechanisms in neurotox, but I also was cherishing the connections I was able to make. In any event, drinking and going out to jazz clubs with various professors didn't hurt either. Perhaps by simply incorporating people from industry and government into the mix, the science world was given a personality and a human-ness that's severely lacking from my within academia.

2. Peru was, as expected, fantastic. I really can't complain about sunny, 85F weather. It was super relaxing, spent time on the beach and ate a lot. The wedding was great-- a lot of fun, beautiful ceremony at sunset over the water... as you can imagine, it was incredibly difficult to return to rain and lab-slave life.

3. Girlfriend and I also found out the sex of the baby (due in the beginning of August)-- it's a girl! Really amazing, and scary at the same time. Girlfriend is already worrying about her getting pregnant. I'm still worried about changing the diapers. Hmm...

Fig. 1. Baby Girl at 20 weeks. She has fingers and hands and a nose! Yeah!

4. Lastly, things in the lab have actually started to turn around!!.... !!! I am slightly hesistant to really celebrate just yet because I still am only half believing it to be true. I am sort of waiting for the other shoe to drop and for things to go horribly wrong.... I'm pretty sure that won't happen, but really, I have no idea what to expect with my work. I can't tell you what exactly changed, but the experiment I had been doing with little success has finally worked. In addition, the results are showing surprisingly drastic differences between my treatments and controls! To that, I simply have to say, Halleloo! (Please refer to Figure 2 if this saying eludes you).

Fig. 2. Shangela from RuPaul's Drag Race on LOGO. Halleloo!

If you haven't already, please watch RuPaul's Drag Race for some pure entertainment in the form of America's Next Top Drag Superstar. These chicas are sexy. Til next time, 'echa pa'lante.'

Grad School Made Me Blind

I want someone to do a study (or, actually, several studies) on grad students working in labs. Here are some ideas so far::

1. Repetitive Stress: No, I'm not referring to the chronic stress from advisor expectations or the constant disappointments. The ergonomics peeps should study repetitive stress due to pipette use, or overuse as the case may be. It's a legitimate problem I worry about.




Fig. 1. The scariest looking lab worker pipetting something colorful (generally not the case).


2.  Blindness: I'm pretty sure that sitting in a dark room for hours staring into a microscope, scanning for and taking pictures of fluorescent-glowing cells is likely going to cause long-term damage to my perfect vision. Prospective cohort?

Fig. 2. Approximate size of and light availble in the room containing the microscope.

         3. General measures of sanity. I think this might actually be ongoing in certain departments-- the attempt to monitor stress and its effects on certain health outcomes. I believe one was related to cancer, actually... Imagine that headline when the study reaches mainstream media-- "Scientists say, Grad school gives you cancer!"

In Better News

Because my last post was oh so uplifting, I thought I should put a quick new note to state that things are not as miserable as they seemed last week.

The microscope is up and running..good enough for me to use but still with issues, so I'll tread lightly. I'm still in the process of optimizing this new assay, but I am hopeful. Aside from the 12-hour time point deal, it's a fairly simple and easy assay for which I can store my samples and do it as I please. Flexibility is always nice.

As for new data, the results from the latest experiment were a bit different than what I had previously seen (of course). The need to potentially switch directions on my project is still to be determined. Let's all cross our fingers that this doesn't have to happen.

In other news, Girlfriend is pregnant! I'm pretty sure anyone who actually reads this knows this by now, but as this blog follows my life both in and out of grad school, I think this is a relevant and important detail. Now the goal is to do my oral exam before mid-August or else I'll be competing with a newborn for prep time. Eeek! :)

Fig. 1. My reaction to Girlfriend being pregnant. Or, future baby.

Speaking to that end, in more good news, I have officially formed my disertation committee. Yay! Now I just need the data and I can make some progress.... 'Till next time.

...Annnnd We're Back.

I've been back from my Christmas break for a couple weeks now and have been trying to hit the ground running in high gear, with an optimistic attitude towards my work. At least, that was the initial intent. I know exactly what needs to get done between now and the beginning of March (primarily in preparation for the annual Society of Toxicology meeting-- in DC this year!), and I'm trying, desperately, to start moving on those things. Of course, like always (it seems), no matter how hard I try to be proactive, forward thinking, and prepared, things NEVER seem to work like they are supposed to. And please, spare me the "metaphor for life" because this is not life-- it's Science! It's SUPPOSED to be a controlled environment where you can manipulate variables for scientific purposes. Liars.

Read: Despondent: adj, de·spon·dent [ di spóndənt ]

1. Extremely unhappy and discouraged

*Warning* Lab ranting ahead::: 
So far, the microscope I use to photograph and thus analyze all of my cells for the most important part of my project, is broken. The guy in charge cannot figure it out and it has since been 'sent out' to be repaired. Trying to stay ahead of the game, I decided to find another way to get my work done. So, I found another micrscope center to use, was trained to use it, and now... am waiting to simply be put on a list in order to sign up to use said microscope... I cannot tell you how frustrating this is.

I've also started a new assay for a different aspect of my project, one that promises to be more consistent and reliable than the dreaded ROS assay. The downside is it invovles a 12-hour treatment, which there is really no good way to go about. I was in the lab around 8:30pm last night making a buffer, and even such a seemingly simple task-- putting different things together in a tube-- somehow failed. A particularly pesky reagent (SDS) failed to dissolve appropriately once combined with other stuff. After some failed attempts to change the pH, I remade a simplified version of the buffer and had some success. Overall, I'm pretty sure the buffer was not good and the samples will likely be a waste. But, at 11pm, you stop caring about such things, and you just go home.

Now, with that said, I am still, somehow, trying to be optimistic about this being a better, more productive year in the lab. Mostly because it just has to be. I'm in a sink-or-swim type of stage in my career here. Or, at least, that's the way I see it. This goes beyond the semi-unrealistic expectations of my advisor and well into my own expectations for myself... expectations I am currently not meeting. And that is what is truly depressing.

Merry Christmas! Love, ROS Assay

Many of you who know me know that I have been battling with this horrible and unreliable assay in the lab for over a year now. I have gotten some useful data, but it was messy, and I have been trying to get "just one more" experiment to help the statistics (good science, right?) for about 6+ months. [Note: The assay measures ROS = Reactive oxygen species produced in response to exposure to a chemical, like pesticides in my case]

Well, ladies and gentlemen, IT FINALLY WORKED!

Fig. 1. Me on 12/15/10

I won't quite say that I'll never have to do this assay again, because that's likely not true. And I also won't say that this means it will work consistetly from now on. BUT, this did work correctly after I changed some things and eliminated some steps, which is very promising for future use. YAY!

In other news, it's almost Christmas! I love Christmas. I am flying home to the family on Tuesday and I'm super excited. It's always a little crazy and stressful seeing all the fam, but Christmas always makes up for all that. Especially Christmas Eve and the 95464575 types of fish we have (ok, more like 6 or 7), but it's definitely my favorite holiday ever. It also helps that I get to see my neice and nephew (one who just turned 4 today! and the other who is already walking around, respectively), and my step-sister whom I haven't seen in over a year! Please refer back to figure 1 for approriate emotional response.

I'll try to keep everyone updated a bit more now that this quarter is over (and that dreaded Biopharm class is complete).

Merry Christmas, happy holidays, and much love (from me, and the ROS assay).

Because she is fabulous

"And, you know, politics aside, the success of Sarah Palin and women like her is good for all women—except, of course—those who will end up, you know, like, paying for their own rape 'kit 'n' stuff.' But for everybody else, it's a win-win. Unless you're a gay woman who wants to marry your partner of 20 years—whatever. But for most women, the success of conservative women is good for all of us. Unless you believe in evolution. You know—actually, I take it back. The whole thing's a disaster."

-Tina Fey, upon winning the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor on Monday.

In other news:

1. The Kinect (for Xbox) is awesome.
2. I'm in a major lab funk.
3. I can't wait for Christmas (except, I can, because of the absurd amount of things that need to get done before then)
4. This biopharmaceutical class is driving me batty.

A wee bit of panic, a large dose of stress

Feeling a bit like this guy today:

I just was informed that I have to prepare a presentation and data to present to the next meeting (Dec. 3rd) for my training grant. Initially, I wouldn't go until next May, but they suddenly rearranged the list. A long way off, you may say.  WRONG.  Wrong, mostly because the way things work with my work and in this lab these days, a month might give me one or two usable experiments. MIGHT is a key word there.  Without more data, I've really nothing new to show for myself since the last meeting in May.  That is pathetic, and it will only seem as such in front of some important people.  Gah.

I'm also working on this big project for that Biopharmaceutical Development class I previously mentioned. The class is super interesting, still, but this project is a beast and we had pretty little direction on how and what to do.  Basically we are just designing a whole plan for testing and developing a new drug (ours is an bivalent antibody for use in Chron's Disease and other Inflammatory Bowel Diseases (IBD)). Pretty overwhelming.

In some better news, the contamination seems to be gone.. for now. I guess that's a good start.