Everything in the lab is going very well. I'm still working on the long, slow and steady process of finding the optimized conditions for the Hippo PCR experiment. This week I ran a lot of RT-PCR's. The most interesting one I ran though was one that involved a temperature gradient to find the best/most efficient annealing temperature for each of the primers. We got pretty good results from the gradient, and found that 52 degrees was the best temperature for most of the primers. This process also taught me the importance of making master mixes when preparing PCR's. When you have to pipet around 50 different PCR tubes each with slight variations, master mixes can save LOADS of time.
I also began isolating RNA from Pancreatic Adenocarcinoma (PDAC). This proved to be more finicky than expected, because PDAC simply doesn't have as many cells as normal pancreas, and therefore there's not as much RNA to be isolated.
For my clinical rotation, Dr. Dunn brought me down to the PACU (Post-Anesthetic Care Unit) to see Electroconvulsive Therapy treatments (ECT's). ECT is a treatment for people with severe depression in which small, controlled seizures are induced on the patient. This treatment was used in the early 1900's, but quickly lost popularity because it was seen as torture. However, with the advancements of anesthesia, the patients are now unconscious throughout the procedure, and have no recollection of the treatment after it is finished. Most patients go for treatments quite regularly (some once a week for months or even years). Though this may seem extremely taxing, it is by far one of the most effective treatments for severe depression. Just as I was in the OR last week, I was thoroughly amazed at what I saw in the PACU. The procedure took a total of 20 minutes per patient from the time their bed rolled into the room to the time it rolled out, and it literally can save their lives. It was incredible!
As for Harvard life, I couldn't be happier. I'm getting closer and closer with my new friends, I'm really enjoying Cambridge, and my psychology class keeps getting more and more interesting. This week we're learning about personality and intelligence. These two areas of psychology can be really hard to grasp - how can you define intelligence anyway? Is it knowledge? Natural brain power? If someone has a below average IQ score, does that mean that they aren't intelligent even if they are a genius at playing some musical instrument or sport? Some of these questions are hard to answer, but it's definitely interesting to learn about!
All in all, everything is going great! I'm so glad I have this opportunity.
-Mike
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