lab work snap shot: past, present, future
Posted by ljacobl on July 14, 2009
Past: I got a paper published, which is very nice to put in the “past work” category. Writing a scientific manuscript for publication is painful and tedious and stressful and hair wrenching for me. I normally agonize over every sentence when I write; rearranging, retyping, and taking long pauses to formulate thoughts and structure. Writing any thing takes me a long time. In fact these last 5 sentences have already taken quite a bit of time for me to pound out. Then, when I’m all done with writing what I want to bestow, I have to edit. I am a horrible speller and normally just guess at punctuation. I have to edit and edit and edit. And edit. I can’t tell you how may drafts of my manuscript I made. It may actually be easier to figure out at what rate I produced drafts rather than the actual number. But, in the end, when it was all done, there was reward. The reward: not having to work on it anymore. It was a good experience though, and it’s nice to have my name published on something for future resumes. You can read the abstract and download my full article here. Have a good nap!
Present: For the first time in the history of my lab we are doing some in vivo cattle experiments with the parasites we study. This is to test whether the parasites that we modify are able to clinically infect the cattle (I have wrote about this before). This experiment has direct consequences on my project. If the cows get sick then it is a good sign that my my work will…work. It is eight days after inoculation and some of the calves are getting a fever ( a very good sign). In the picture are James and Ralph. They are very good at what they do, and care very much for their animals.
Future: I’m in the process of developing my own “mutant” parasite to inoculate into cattle. My parasite line will advance us one step closer to develop a dual vaccine system that will not only protect against the symptoms of the disease but also attack the tick vectors of the disease. Do you see GFP, BSD, and more importantly Bm86 expression from my transfected parasites in these contrast pictures? Well, it is my job to find out.
lpappal said
I’ve read this blog several times trying to understand in a little detail what you have accomplished. Way to go… You have done well.