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Third Time's A Charm!!!

Posted by Danielle Black on 2009-06-19 - no comments
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As a participant in the Howard Hughes Research Fellows I will be spending my third summer conducting research at Duke (hence the title of this blog entry).  Although I enjoyed the time I spent in my previous lab, it was a chemistry lab and I have come to learn that I am much fonder of biology than chemistry.  Since this is my first summer working in a biology lab I am looking forward to learning about a new area of research.  I had previously gained a basic understand of some of the techniques I am doing this summer, such as PCR, but now I have the opportunity to combine that with once in a lifetime hands on experience!

I am also looking forward to gaining a better understanding of the many research opportunities that our available on Duke's campus, and how I could become involved in them.  My expectations for this summer are very high, I feel as if Howard Hughes will be a chance for me to grow as an individual, learn more about my school and its contributions to the scientific community, and get to know some amazing people at the same time!

So why is the third time a charm? It's simple, because it's filled with grand opportunities!!

 

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Come "YODER" With Me!!!

Posted by Danielle Black on 2009-06-11 - one comment
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To begin, my name is Danielle Black and I'm a rising sophomore at Duke from Wilmington,NC.  As a participant in the 2009 Howard Hughes Research Fellows Program I will be working in the Yoder lab in the Biology and Evolutionary Anthropology Department at Duke.  During my research I will be conducting PCRs and DNA Sequences/Extractions to help determine the mode of speciation between two species of mouse lemurs from Madagascar, Microcebus murinus and Microcebus griseorufus. 

Madagascar is one of the most diverse countries on Earth and the only place where lemurs can be found naturally!  The mouse lemur is one of the speciose primates, and the Yoder lab is looking to discover just how these lemurs became so speciose.

                                                                                  Microcebus murinus

(photo from http://pin.primate.wisc.edu/factsheets/entry/mouse_lemur)

This first week of research has been both interesting and educational.  Within my first four days I have already done PCRs, DNA extractions, and DNA sequencing.  I have also worked on editing DNA sequences.  Although I have already been exposed to several techniques, there is still much for me to learn about the background surrounding my research and the research of the lab as a whole. 

Over the next 8 weeks I will continue blogging about my experience in the Howard Hughes Program.  In the meantime, here's a small glimpse into the world of my lab.

  

Laurn Chan, the amazing post doc I will be working with, and Caroline, an undergrad from UNC (she's great too), cloning some of Caroline's samples. ( I'm not quite that far along yet.)

Here I'm loading my samples into the gel to run a gel electrophoresis.  (Hopefully they'll come out nice like the first ones!)

Sadly, Dr. Yoder is out of town so I couldn't take her picture.  Instead I have a snapshot of her name tag outside of the lab. 

So that's a basic introduction of myself, my research, and my wonderful lab group.  Thanks for reading my first blog, stop by again soon!! 

Tagged: diversity, mouse-lemurs, speciation, Yoder
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