Winter Break 2006-07

It's been a long time, so lets do some catching up.

Lab Related Stuff:
I recently went into the lab and took some pictures so that I could put them on the group webpage. I'll put a few of them throughout this post so you can all get a good look at what a tissue engineering lab looks like. Actually, it look remarkably similar to many other biological laboratories but it would crush the frail grad students if people went around telling them that.

Not much has been happening in the lab since the break started. Splinter and myself have started a new batch of cells, which are currently on their way out. Since polymers are our current problem, with the new set we tried two NEW polymer's we called EVA and MRK 23. We have been pretty surprised by the results, the cells seem to be living pretty well in both, but EVA control turned into liquid about a week after encapsulation... which is no good at all. The picture to the right is of Rachael Mooney (Splinter) preparing our samples to be looked at under the Confocal microscope, which will be shown below. We took some images on Friday of last week, they looked good, but were not all the spectacular. We really expected a lot more neurite growth, but it is okay, because we only got through the EVA samples before we had to leave, and we froze the rest so we could image them on Monday. I think that the MRK 23 samples will have much better neurite growth. I have nothing to base that on but pure hope.

So here is what the confocal looks like. The thing has its own laser system that puts out a lot of heat, which is problematic when you are imaging in the dark in a small room. That combination easily puts poor Andy to sleep during confocal sessions.

We are trying to get good images to put in our publication to show evidence that we did in fact increase neurite growth and extension. But with all the crappy polymer, this is a very difficult task. I think that next semester we are going to try to quantify it by other means so we are not dependent on being able to see the neurites, which are surprisingly difficult to see even under 40x magnification on the confocal.


In one of my courses, we had a project where we had to build a circuit that we found ourselves. Well, I like to come up with these kinds of things on my own, so I designed my own circuit for something I needed. I called it a syringe rotisserie, which would be a mechanical device that turned syringes really slowly. My plan was to build the circuit and forget about it, but as it happens, it was decided by the higher ups that something like that would be really useful in the lab. The completed circuit got me a C in the class, but for some reason these crazies in the lab still wanted it, so I had a conference with my father about the feasibility of coming up with the mechanical side of the project. We talked about this a lot when I went home for break, and after several design changes we finally came up with something that I believe will work, and after getting a crappy start on it myself I left for Colorado and left him to build the mechanics. Above is the portion of the sterile hood that this device has to fit in, under that UV lamp. By the way, those are Splinters hands. I told her that she was gunna be the new Country Crock butter hand person because of this photo. And just to rat her out, she didn't spray her hands before putting them in the hood! This is a no no.

So, life around the lab is pretty uneventful. I have taken to task, trying to figure out why the polymer always comes out differently. Splinter thinks it is a lost cause, but I am sure there is something subtle that is going wrong, and that is my specialty. So that is all about the lab for now. The next post will be about me and my adventures so far this break.

To the right here is our exploded hood that has been hanging around the lab since this summers excitement. This is a very large portion of any tour I give of the lab. If the confocal room is closed I spend a lot of time telling people about how awesome our exploded hood is.

Andy

Get Ready, Im Coming BACK!

Hey everyone that reads this nonsense,

Get ready! Im am coming back. My semester of hell is over and the grades are coming. They are crappy as hell, but I am very proud of myself for hanging in there and keeping sane for the most part. Next semester is going to be a lot easier, and I hope to patch up my GPA with it. So alls that is left is updating my blog, cleaning up my apartment (I cease to do that when stressed, and stressed I have been), scheduling the GRE's and getting apps ready for grad school.

I recieved a digital camera for Festive Holiday, and so I'll be getting pictures of the lab next time I go in. I plan for my next post to be about my lab and what I am up to. I also have tons of stories from the break and semester, so its gunna be a long one. I hope everyone is ready!

Andy

Busy Busy Busy

So, right now I exist in the lower rings of hell. You know, the one where the three headed devil is munching on the sinners. Now, I'm not much of a sinner, but I did declare physics as my major, and apparently that is a bad enough sin to get me here. Anyway, I have been really busy, but one of the things I am making in this hell I exist in is a mock group page for the group I do research with. This is for my EBIO class, check out the page I am making at: Mahoney Group Mock Page