Duke University | Howard Hughes Undergraduate Program

My research experience this summer was absolutely amazing. There is so much that I loved about this summer…I don’t even know where to start!

The lab. I want to thank my mentor Mardee, my PI Doctor Telen, and everyone in the lab (Susan, Carol, Milena, and Rahima) for making my research experience so much fun! I got to really see what it was like to do research every day like a job. I got to create my own experiments, learn new techniques, analyze and present my data, and at the end make a finished product: the poster. It was really nice to experience for 8 weeks what researchers do on a daily basis. In addition, it was nice to have a sort of family in the lab where people were always talking about their lives and sharing stories. I’ve concluded from my experience that I loved thinking science all summer…even though it was kinda weird when I would be designing experiments while lying in bed, waiting to fall asleep.

Howard Hughes activities. It was interesting getting together with all the other fellows and learning about their research, while sharing my own research. It was fun learning about research going on at Duke and learning to be a better scientist by improving my poster-making and communication skills. Thank you to all the Howard Hughes staff (Dean Nijhout, Suzanne, and Alex) for all that you have done!

Nights and weekends. I don’t even think I can recall most of the fun things I did this summer with other Howard Hughes fellows and friends. Just a few memories: The Wilmington Beach Trip. The Quarry Trip with the not-so-safe cliff diving. The Late Night Basketball Games. The Homemade Dinners from Indian Food to Pizza to Omelets. The Numerous Potlucks. The Mafia Games. The Lakers Games. The Vermonster from Ben and Jerry’s. Feeding the Ducks in the Gardens. The Trip to UNC. The Too Many Trips to Mount Fuji’s. The Fireworks and Barbeque on 4th of July. The Dancing in the Rain. Lap Tag. And so many more things that I can’t possibly list them all.

I’m sad that the program is over, but I am happy that it happened! Thinking in the short term future…I am definitely going to continue in my lab with an independent study next semester…it’ll be weird though not going to lab every day…and only being able to go in between or after classes! Next summer, I would be open to maybe doing another similar research program or something in my lab. Thinking in the long term future…I still don’t know. I’ve come to love research a lot from this experience, but at the same time I can’t tear myself away from the medical field. I love being with people and helping them and medicine fascinates me. I don’t think I am the only one with this dilemma though…there must have been a reason they created the MD/PhD program. It’s okay though…I still have a couple years to decide…and if I still haven’t decided by then…then maybe a MD/PhD program is really the thing for me.

Thank you everyone who has read my blogs! Now I am on my plane back home to California and then to Hawaii! Bye! =)

 I really liked the seminars that we had this summer in the program. It was interesting to hear what different labs around campus were doing and the seminars got me interested in a whole bunch of things. There were some seminars that I went to thinking “This seminar is going to be boring because this subject matter doesn’t interest me,” but surprisingly when the left the seminar I would be very interested in the subject matter. I thought it was really nice of the speakers to take time out of their days to talk to us and explain their research. My favorite part about the seminars was beginning of each one when the speaker would give a brief overview of how they go to where they are. Many of the speakers got to where they are in very unconventional ways by just seeing where life took them. Their stories helped me feel comfortable where I am now, not really knowing what I want to do in the future, but really being interested in a whole bunch of things. Also, the seminars were a great way to see everyone from the program since we don’t all live right next to each other!

Other news: I finished my poster! It was actually a lot of fun making the poster and at the end looking over my poster, I felt proud of what I had done this summer! And then today, I semi-retired my binder…it was getting too full from all the data from this summer…so I organized it and put a table of contents and put it on a shelf where there are binders from the early 90s. I’ll probably refer back to it a lot next semester as I continue building upon my project that I started this summer, but for now it’s accumulated dust and making believe that it is ancient. This reminds me…we are almost done…sadness. It seems like just yesterday that I got my first piece of data, new binder, and everything. But I’ve learned not to be sad that it’s over, but happy that it happened!

 Wow…I think I recalculated 240 in my head at least 5 times to make sure that yes I have actually worked that many hours these past 6 weeks. When I first started, I expected to be at this point in my project during about week 2. However, I have learned that in an experiment 100 things will go wrong before 1 thing goes right, but that is just how science is and I’m finding troubleshooting not so bad now. It can be fun at times…its like a mystery. A lot of the first few weeks were spent trying to see the aggregates in both the cell culture and flow cytometry methods. We had to get the right antibodies, set the right parameters in the FACS machine, get our timings correct, etc. However, now I can truly say that we see aggregates in both methods.

Anyways, at this point in my research, I’ve found some interesting things out, but a lot of them don’t really pertain to my project. It’s funny, because every time I find something unexpected I go investigate that for a while, and my project is kind of put on hold for a couple days. After doing that several times, I think I can say that my research is going well, but my project not so much. I haven’t really been able to see any difference in the number of aggregates when the RBCs are stimulated with epinephrine in both the flow cytometry method and the cell culture method. However, I really haven’t had time to try each experiment more than once so I can’t draw any conclusions.

However, there are several interesting results I have found from simply trying to see and quantify the aggregates. First of all, I have found that despite drawing the blood in a tube with EDTA, tube with EDTA and Ca, tube with heparin, or tube with PPACK, I still see aggregates. Hence, the aggregates are not an artifact of the tube we draw the blood into. Furthermore, I have observed that not only do monocytes form aggregates, but so do lymphocytes and granulocytes. When I first started my experiment, I thought that only monocytes formed aggregates, but now I have found that lots of things do. I just got an antibody specific to monocytes to help get an idea of what percentage of the aggregates are monocytes as compared to other white blood cells. I am excited to find out on Monday!

Also, as a control, I used my own blood to isolate and grow monocytes, which was really exciting. I did a whole blood smear and giemsa stain on my blood and it was so cool to see my own blood cells and whether they form aggregates and stuff!

Outside the lab, life has been fun! I’ve moved on to cooking without recipes and just sort of experimenting. Last weekend, we went to the quarry, which was really fun, especially jumping off cliffs into the water! I saw Harry Potter this week, which I liked despite having forgotten most of the story. I’ve been swimming and playing tennis a lot, which is always fun! And I even managed to finish my second book of the summer…now I am starting Catch-22!

 Research or Medicine? I have asked myself this question over and over again, and still I do not know which one I would like to pursue as a career. But yesterday something really interesting happened - I saw the two fields in action together, working simultaneously, one building upon the other.

For one of my experiments yesterday, I needed to get fresh blood from a sickle cell patient, which I would then immediately transfer to a tube with PPACK. So I had to go to the sickle cell clinic here at Duke. Sitting in the clinic in my lab coat, with my box of tubes and solutions and pipets, I watched as the doctors came and went. When the patient I needed came in, everyone went to work. The hospital administrators went to the patient with the consent forms we needed to try and get the patient to participate in the study. The patient, excited to be part of the study, consented to being drawn twice so that we could get the blood we needed. The nurse drew the patient's blood in the special tube I requested and handed it over to someone who delivered it to me. I rushed to an unused room and added the PPACK immediately and my sample was ready for my experiment. In the long term, the chain of events will hopefully reverse. If my study goes well, then eventually drugs can be created to stop the monocyte, platelet, and reticuolocyte aggregates that form in sickle cell patients' blood. These drugs can then be administered to the patient. And the really cool thing is that maybe the people who donated their blood for our experiments will be the ones who benefit.

During this whole process, what I found really interesting was how well the two fields can work together. The doctors and hospital administrators were very willing to help us get the blood we needed for our study. The patient was enthusiastic about being a part of a study that in the end could potentially help her. I was determined not to let this precious blood we had gotten go waste. Medicine helping research, research helping medicine. It is a really cool concept to see in action. It was my PI who made all of this possible. A part of both worlds, she essentially ties the two together by being a doctor who sees sickle cell patients and at the same time runs a lab where new research is being done to help her patients.

Does this mean I am leaning towards an MD/PHD program in the future? I don't know. All I know at this point is that i am fascinated by the way that the medical and research fields can be so so intertwined.

This week I was exposed several times to the topic of responsible research conduct.  As part of the Howard Hughes Program we watched the movie, “And the Band Played On”, which specifically dealt with the research that was first conducted on HIV and the controversy surrounding that research.  Then I read several articles about other articles being retracted and found some retracted articles on my own.  Finally, I had a conversation with the author of the paper whose results I am trying to reproduce, which gave me a unique insight into the field of responsible research.

After this week on responsible research I feel that there are two different types of “misconducts” in research.  One type is fabricating data intentionally and publishing material that you know is not true.  This type of misconduct happens mostly because of the intense competition for grants.  I agree with many who say that this kind of research is unacceptable because it hinders the main goal of research – to make progress in science.  However, this kind of misconduct will always be present because there will never be enough grants for everyone.  Having enough grants would require too much money and without competition for grants there may be less of a sense of urgency in labs.  Therefore it is really up to each person to make the right choice. 

The other type of “misconduct”, which I put in quotation marks because I personally do not think falls under the category of misconduct, is publishing results that someone genuinely thinks are true at the time, but later turn out to be unrepeatable or flawed.  I do not think that these mistakes should be considered misconduct, but rather necessary stepping-stones of science.   In the movie, the CDC group did not publish its findings about HIV and its transmission immediately because it was not considered scientifically sound.  However, had they published their results, they could have possibly reduced the number of cases by making people aware of the means of transmission.  They would have helped other groups also studying HIV by sharing their findings among the scientific community.  Even if they were wrong, other groups would still benefit from knowing what they did and what information they found.

So this past week, I talked to the person who wrote the paper I am following in my research.  It was actually really cool to talk to her because I never imagined that I could call the person who wrote an article and talk to them about their work.  I learned how connected the scientific community actually is.  She was really helpful, which was a surprise to me because I thought she would be reluctant to help someone who is doing similar research as her.  Plus I thought she might be a little unwilling to share her protocols, which took years to perfect, with someone who wishes to repeat her experiments in a matter of weeks.  However, to my surprise, she was really nice and helpful.  She gave me many tips about the protocols she used and even offered to give me materials if I was unable to obtain them in a timely fashion. 

Anyways, back to the point, one thing I found really surprising in our conversation was that she kept telling me about how unsure she was of her results and how she kept trying new techniques and materials to make sure her results were real.  She also kept saying how glad she was that I was repeating her experiment so that it would give her a peace of mind to know that her results were real.  Let’s say one day her results turn out to be unrepeatable.  There were certain conditions in her lab or with her materials that allowed certain results to be seen, but that condition does not exist in the human body.  Then would she be accused of misconduct?  I would argue no.  Should her paper be retracted?  I think it would be, but that there should not be blame or stigma associated with the paper being retracted.  She genuinely thought her results were real and tried her best to ensure that they were real.  Fear of having results that turn out to be wrong does make you more careful, but in cases where data and results are needed right away, it also hinders useful information from being released.  Furthermore, even published papers with mistakes can be helpful for other lab groups who can continue the research and find out why the mistakes are present and work on them.  However genuine mistakes should not be looked at with such a scornful eye because we are human after all.  Mistakes, even in published papers, are learning lessons.