Poster, Poster, Poster

This week has been nothing but poster preparation and lots of data. I didn't realize how much data I had and the amount of variables that play into the statistics of the research itself. I had to go to tutpring math right after my internship which was somewhat overwhelming. I love math but my mind wasnt in a happy place after all that data! I am extremely thankful for Josh and Matt for helping with every step of the way throughout this process. I felt like I was asking way too many questions but I felt like I wanted to make sure that I was doing everything right so come presentation time on Monday at the research conference, I will be prepared to answer questions.

My data and working on Excel for hours got to the point were I was stressing a lot and just wanted to finish it. Initially, I had finished my graphs and the data was driving me crazy. Come to find out that error bars were too large so I ended up removing the outliers from my data. I further used the days one and three numbers to come up with a mean for the two and replaced the outlier with the mean. I later used this data to come up with new averages and recalculated the standard deviations to make new graphs with smaller and more reasonable error bars. When I finally posted the new tables on my poster, I felt a sense of accomplishment and was over-joyed to complete it! I cannot wait until Monday, which just happened to also be my birthday (wink, wink!) to present my beautiful poster and research. The thing I'm most looking forward is seeing other peoples' research! It'll be interesting to hear about their adventures in the lab and about their research as well!

Crazy data everywhere so it was fun to sort  through it all to see what it all meant:)

Preview to my poster (this is the one with the super big error bars! Look out next week for my poster with smaller error bars :D)

SNext Friday, myself and other STEM Scholars, along with professor Schampel are going to the Desert Botanical Garden! I've been wanting to go for a while and this is the perfect opportunity to do so! I was interested in the butterfly exhibit especially after skimming the butterfly reference books in the lab and now we can all go check it together as a group so I'm really, REALLY excited :)


Outside of my internship, I am really busy for the last few internship applications that I plan on applying for and this weekend will be going to ASU to tour the biodesign institute which I am really excited about! I hope you all had a wonderful week and an even better weekend!

Photo of the week:Saw this at the local library! Pretty cool!

Greetings,

Khadidja M.

Short Week, lot's of Work!

A little less than two weeks away from the Arizona State University research conference! I'm really stoked to prepare my poster and present my work! Everyone in the lab is working really hard to complete in time. I have to work with Matt today to get my data together and I didn't realize the amount of stats that is present in my experiment. We are accounting for a lot of variables but I'm exited to see what we come up with! 

My poster project is coming along! I completed the abstract, the materials and today I will complete the methods, references and acknowledgement portions as well. Writing hasn't been my strongest point academically but with a lot of practice with English classes, science lab reports and this blog, I feel like I'm conquering my fear of writing. 

  

This is just an additional photo I took of the door handle that was tested and I want to include it on my poster as well as a visual representation of the sample size along with a diagram that'll show how I swabbed the door handles.

I haven't gram stained this week as my poster for the ASU conference will only include the numerical data from my bacteria whereas the second research conference in May will include the identification of bacteria. I grew to also love gram staining because it allows me to be precise and more accurate in my technique so I look forward to getting back into after the ASU conference. 

As I was walking to the lab earlier this week, I came across this bird who was playing in the puddle and  I thought it was artistic in a sense so I took a picture so I can share it with you guys. :) If I were a bird, I'd be this bird because I like water. 

Next weeks blog will include more of my poster and maybe some gram staining towards the end of the week but we shall see how that comes along. Hope you had a productive week and hope you have an even better weekend. Take care,

Khadidja M.

Last week has been super hectic and deadlines had to be met but I'm so glad I got everything done in a timely fashion and I had a three day weekend to relax, work on calculus and prepare for my physics exam for Wednesday! Three out of the six internships that I'm applying for had due dates for the 15th so I was busy emailing professors for letter of recommendations and working endlessly on personal statements and so forth. Thanks to Amanda, Professor Ana and Professor Schampel for writing letters for me! I appreciate it so much! Thank you once again :)

For my internship, last week was super interesting as I started growing my bacteria colonies in TSB tubes to be able to have enough for gram staining. I did lots of gram staining on Tuesday and my technique has improved tremendously from last week! I started air-drying the micro slides to prevent the wax pencil lining to mix with my sample itself as it did previously! Furthermore, I'm learning how to use the camera for the microscope so I'm able to take pictures and so on.

As I reached into the fridge to grab some more TSA plates, I glanced over and found these "MAC" plates. When I think of MAC, usually the cosmetic company pops into my mind but not anymore!!! I wanna know what these plates are used for. Anyone wanna enlighten me?

 Day zero samples came back clear as can be, once again. My technique is getting better guys!!!!!

 I thought I'd get a little more creative and have some fun in the lab so I assembled my TSA plates like this:

Sorta reminds me of  stair-cases, no?!

As I was working on one of my personal statements for an internship, I was looking up quotes on being biologically connected as human beings and this quote caught my eye. I truly believe in this statement and I thought it did a a good job at getting my point across. What do you think? 

Last but certainly not least, here is my picture of the week! It made me laugh because I think dinosaurs are the coolest and I read that quote in my Morgan Freeman voice so it was hilarious!














This week is super short but a lot is going on in and outside of school. I plan on preparing my research poster for the conference in March this week! I got an outline started and I'm waiting for the template to be mailed out so I can put everything together. I'm looking forward to the conference as it will allow me to present my work and see what other students are working on as well.


Hope you all had a fabulous three-day weekend, now it's back to business! Have a great week!

Greetings, Khadidja M.

Tempe Historical Museum

A friend and I went to the Tempe Historical Museum last Friday for a speech on Malcolm X, in celebration of Black History Month. We arrived earlier than we were supposed to so we decided to check out the museum itself and I found an entire exhibition on medical history in Tempe! I would have never known about it until I saw it and I super exited to check it out. I wanted to share a few pictures from that day and if you ever get the chance to go and check it out, I would highly recommend it as well! Great for the entire family and admission is free!

This reminded me of my  research experiment. 

I like her hair. 

Nurses outfit back in the day. So legit.

Home-made pharmaceuticals materials. 

MUST* Public Health is a concern for everyone. Take the appropriate steps to prevent spread of diseases etc. 

Old-Skool wheelchair. Looks comfy to me! Tea, anyone?

TEMPE HISTORY MUSEUM

Address: 809 E Southern Ave, Tempe, AZ 85282 Phone:(480) 350-5100 Transit: Southern Ave & Rural Rd

Take Three.

Another week has passed! I'm getting used to my super busy schedule and once again, it's all about time-management and making a healthy balance between school, home and everything else.

In the lab, I am continuing on with my contamination experiment on door handles. The weirdest thing happened where the number of colonies actually decreased throughout the week. I'm guessing it's because the door handles were cleaned by the janitors or I had an error by collecting too much sample but at the same time, it's been the same sampling size throughout the initial week of experiment. I did some gram staining for practice, sort of like my trial week for plating and so forth. I learned something new today: the purpose of the wax on micro-slides is just for the person to know where their sample was placed. I thought it was to keep the water and sample in place and would press too hard on the micro-slides. Doing so, and drying my slides on a hot plate, the wax would displace itself from the initial circular shape and make weird "G" looking shapes and so forth. This made it difficult for me to identify the bacteria. I plan to use what I learned for future reference and hopefully my gram staining next week will be more accurate and easier to use when looking in the microscope.

Gram Staining! I love the colors.

Art-sy drying book. 

upside igloo-looking bacteria. 

Day zero are clear, once again! (I'm doing something right!)

Day two plates with bacteria in 'em.

Last but certainly not least, Josh and I decided to grow some of the colonies in TSB tubes, insert them in the incubator for 24 hours and this allows the bacteria to grow and multiply, allowing us to have plenty of bacteria for gram staining and so forth. This method would be more effective than scraping the colony itself and not having anymore left if we scrap the entire colony out. I shall check on these tomorrow morning to look for bacterial growth and once that's complete, I can do more (effective) gram staining and begin identifying the bacteria. 

Day one  TSB tubes going into the incubator for growth time!

P.S. Thanks to Jeremy for finding this ^ brand-new red rack for me (red being my favorite color!). I put my name on it to claim ownership :D THANK YOU JEREMY! I love it.

Photos of the Week:
(this is a new segment where I'll share non-internship related pictures from my week, hope you enjoy them!)

Sunrise on  Wednesday

Sunset also on Wednesday

 I love the sun/sky/stars etc.

Hope you all are having a great and productive week! Keep it going!

Greetings, Khadidja.

Microscopes, applications and football.

This week has been super hectic for me. Apart from the internship, I finished my blog post about the REU's which I'm really exited about. If only one person can benefit from that post some-how, I'll feel accomplished! I'm busy with the transfer process as well but I rather be busy than bored so I'm not complaining!

This week in the lab was really exiting! I starting gram staining and I was able to prepare my plates and will be able to identify my bacteria now. Josh and Matt also plan on helping me use the microscope to photograph my samples and will be sharing those with you in the near future.

This is the sample that I used for gram staining. (it looks heart-shaped, just in time for Valentines day.)

Gram staining sample. I plan on researching more on the biochemical aspect of gram staining. (blog post, perhaps?)

Day zero samples came back clear again. 

I like this pic as it shows my swabbing technique. I'm getting better!

This shows the inside anterior handle (left) and the  outside posterior handle (right)  of the women's restroom and you can clearly see that the inside handle is less germy than the outside handle.  

Similarly, this shows the inside anterior handle (left) and the outside posterior handle (right) of the men's restroom handles, the inside showing more colonies than the outside. 

Day one samples.

Not sure on how to flip photos on Blogger... help?

Last but not least in my photo gallery, I drew a flowchart for derivatives and integrals while I was studying for my calculus exam and this is what it looks like:                                             I hope students who are visual learners, like myself, can benefit from this.

Today, I am also going to the lab to do some gram staining and identifying bacteria. Hopefully, I can learn how to use the camera on the microscope so I can share my findings with you all. I hope you all are having a fabulous week and an even better weekend. Anyone going to watch the Superbowl this weekend???

Greetings, Khadidja M.