Gwen in Beijing

A place for friends, family, and nosy busybodies to see exactly what Gwen's up to in China.

Monday, July 9, 2007

What I'm Researching

My internship at PKU is a working internship, which means that I spend most of my day helping out in the biotech lab. At the end of my internship I will write a paper on both my research and cultural experiences. Below is an abstract describing the outline of my projects:

The first part of my research will focus on refining the steps of tissue culture in regenerating the plant hawthoria comptoniana. This may include analyzing such variables as the sterilization of the explant sample, the composition of the growth medium, and light exposure received while the callus is forming.

Hawthoria comptoniana is a plant that originates from South Africa and does not perform well in China because it is sensitive to drought. Creating a regeneration system for this plant is the first step in determining the genes responsible for drought resistance, and whether this can be transferred to rice. The genes SOS-1, SOS-2, and SOS-3 are of particular interest because they have already been shown to have function related to soil salinity in Arabidopsis.

I will be contributing to this research by performing the initial step of regenerating hawthoria comptoniana. By manipulating the above-mentioned variables, and then analyzing the resulting callus quality, it is hypothesized that the optimal tissue culture procedure may be determined.

Unfortunately, calluses take several months to develop, so I will be unable to see the direct results of my work. Instead, I will be photographing and analyzing the calluses previously cultured.

In this way, the conclusions I draw from collecting data concerning previously cultured calluses will be predictive of my expected results of my own tissue culture work, and affect the decisions I make concerning the process.

The second part of my research will concern two strains of maize, one fertile and one sterile (unable to self-pollinate) as a result of a genetic mutation. When the two strains are crossed, the resulting generation is sterile. It is unknown which protein is responsible for the plant’s sterility.

Cross-breeding varieties of a plant is important for producing more robust and high-yielding strains. Normally, plant breeders would work to solve the described problem with fertility by searching for a variety which, when crossed with the sterile variety, would produce a fertile hybrid. It is hypothesized that this problem may also be solved by understanding the cause of the original strain’s sterility.

In order to locate the proteins related to the strain’s sterility, I will be running samples of maize protein from both the fertile and sterile strain through SDS-PAGE (sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis). The two strains are genetically identical except for the mutation causing sterility. By comparing the gels of the two strains, it is hoped that anomalous proteins may be identified for further study.

If the research is successful, and the proteins of interest are identified, the data will be sent to another research institute where in-depth 2D protein analysis can be conducted.

5 Comments:

At July 9, 2007 at 10:04 PM , Blogger Karen & Warren Varley said...

Very impressive.

Good hunting, daughter!

 
At July 9, 2007 at 10:13 PM , Blogger Karen & Warren Varley said...

Excerpt from a chat about this:

gwen says: (9:44:03 PM)but it's based on my convos with Dr. K which are always interesting...
gwen says: (9:44:27 PM)anyway, I'll post it after I have some English-speakers look it over

Dad says: (9:44:43 PM)I'm sure. Not every incoming freshman gets college prep from a Yale professor.

gwen says: (9:45:07 PM)Ha! and even fewer get biking lessons!

 
At July 9, 2007 at 10:34 PM , Blogger Mary Fitz said...

Umm pretty sure I vote you smarter than certain people aka you know i'm talking about. Wow. So i did a little research on my own to figure out what on earth you were talking about. Sounds cool and just "slightly" complicated to my ears. Or eyes... technically I'm reading. Hmmmmmm.....So will you find out your results while you are at Grinnell? That'd be cool!

 
At July 13, 2007 at 2:20 PM , Blogger Mary Fitz said...

Heeeeeeeey! I vote... NEW BLOG. haha. I'm at the urbandale library... thought of you. walked by a computer and WA-LAH! i'm here. I know this isn't an email but i hope you are having lots of fun. And hope the great wall of china marathon... i mean walk. lol was wonderful. You should have done a foot video - "john style". ooo well. My eye is really bothering me today and i don't know why. And now everyone knows. MISS YA!
l8rz
(*)MAR(*)

 
At July 23, 2007 at 11:05 AM , Anonymous Anonymous said...

I finally got back to your blog site- to see the Great Wall. Wonderful- all up and down there. Were the toilets the usual hole in the floor variety? This is wonderful that you can share with us this way- Helen and Bob Farr

 

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