3-in-1
RCR
The day after we watched "And the band plays on", I was talking to my mentor Bryan about the film. I discovered that while I was of the opinion that Robert Gallo was completely in the wrong, he thought that Gallo had made amazing discoveries.
This made me think a lot. I've lived in the United States since I was 5 years old, so I've been going to school here since kindergarten. From the time we started learning about World War II in history class, I'd always been told that Japan caused unforgivable atrocities to happen at Pearl Harbor, that they had killed many an innocent citizen...and the teacher would go on to gloss over what had happened with the atomic bombs. Every summer, however, I would go to history museums and the Hiroshima Peace Memorial in Japan and would learn about what had happened in Hiroshima and Nagasaki...and would learn very little about Pearl Harbor. I was always confused. Was the United States or Japan in the wrong? Which was worse - Pearl Harbor or the atomic bombs? Every time someone in America mentions Japan's role in WWII, I get flustered and find myself wanting to defend Japan. Every time someone in Japan mentions U.S.'s role, I become uncomfortable and stick up for the United States. Basically, I'm just a jumble of emotions whenever the topic comes up...
So my point is that I don't really know what's true and what's false in the AIDS situation. I may be simple-minded, but I'm just glad that everything that was discovered was discovered and that we've found out so many things since the time when we didn't know AIDS even existed.
...On to things I do know!
My research question
The Reya lab concentrates on a particular type of cancer called leukemia, which is a cancer of the blood or bone marrow. There are two types of leukemia: lymphocytic leukemia and myelogenous leukemia. Lymphocytic leukemia results in cancer in cells that normally form lymphocytes (white blood cells). Myelogenous leukemia results in cancer in cells that normally form red blood cells, some types of white blood cells, and platelets. The Reya lab concentrates on the latter - myeloid leukemia.
In the lab, we look at the basic functions of stem cells and their role in myeloid leukemia. For example, something I am working on is the mechanism of cellular division in leukemia stem cells. When a stem cell undergoes cellular division, it can divide so that it results in either (1) two stem cells or two committed cells (symmetric differentiation) or (2) it can divide so that there is one stem cell and one differentiated cell (asymmetric differentiation).
How do leukemia stem cells perform asymmetric cell division? It has been found that different proteins are distributed differently in stem cells and differentiated cells. In particular, the Numb protein is found to be distributed to the differentiated cells and the Notch protein to the undifferentiated cell.
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What affect do the different types of cell division have on myeloid leukemia? That's what the overarching question is! :)
[Divide and conquer: how asymmetric division shapes cell fate in the hematopoietic system (Nature, 2008)]
Along with the looking at the presence of different proteins in symmetric and asymmetric stem cells, I am doing some imaging. For example, here is a picture of one of my H&E stained-slides!
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Randomness
Today I was cranking for hours on the cryostat, and I realized what I want to do. My life goal, right now, is to go into an M.D.-Ph.D. program, specialize in hematology or osteopathology, and do research on leukemia (I love working at the Reya lab, if you haven't noticed =]). I've always been enchanted by the aspect of having both an M.D. and a Ph.D.. No, I don't think it's the "I want to have as many badges as possible" boy scouts phenomenon. It's not. As I'm doing research, I find myself getting caught up in the every day, mundane aspects. I find myself being lost in how clean my peaks are in my PCR results, how clean my sections are while using the cryostat, how much bleeding there is from the eosin stain. I know it sounds grandiose and arrogant, but really what I'm trying to do is to help leukemia patients, right? I think if I were to practice alongside of doing research, I would constantly be reminded of what my "true" purpose is. I would meet actual leukemia patients who are waiting for new treatments - new treatments that I could help in discovering or improving. I think every time I would go to the hospital, I would be renewed. It's not all about writing grants, getting papers published, new apparatuses, and collaborators. It's about the patients. The disease. Of course I would panic. But I need panic. I do well with panic.
So that's my shpeel for the day. Thanks for reading! :)
