dcbio.org

Freedom.

GAATTC — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 18:26:55 +0000

Just a non-sequitor thought.

This is a new life. I’m in a new direction where I’m no longer relying on the invisible. I look back and I think of the years of growing cultures, hoping to extract functional proteins, and develop new drugs. We were constantly digging for these invisible bands to find something new that will lead to the next grant. And now, that’s done.

I have a great deal of love and excitement for those at my former employers who are still doing this. I’m sure one day, I’ll be back, but after 10 years, it’s a nice break to work, measure my rewards in dollars, and not have to curse the ever elusive band. There’s something more concrete about developing a business, over searching for an answer that may not be there. I have so much respect for those that develop life careers in science.

After 10 Years!

GAATTC — Mon, 11 Jul 2011 17:16:56 +0000

After 10 years working for various PI’s at Georgetown University, I have left the scene. That is, once again, the funding ran out, and I was left holding my own, looking for the next gig. Currently I’m working managing a business that’s about to open in Bethesda. It’s a different direction, and I’m excited about the opportunity. Working directly with customers and clients is a different world from praying that your reactions will work, or worse yet, wondering why they didn’t work. This direction has a great benefit, of marking your success with dollar returns. If your pitch hits, then sales are made, and deals are closed. When deals are closed there’s a direct measurement of your success. I find this exciting and very rewarding. I look forward to bring these skills, some day in the future, to a biotech venture that I manage, or possibly own. Great things to come!

Fringe

GAATTC — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 17:56:36 +0000

One of the greatest fringe benefits is the pleasure and positive vibe from getting your assay to work. After fighting a need to survive and create good reliable data, there’s the hell of finding out your assay doesn’t work. Follow that by spending a month or two fighting the odds, searching for tubes that don’t exist, transforming strains, and searching for what’s not working, you step back, and yes, your tube changes color, and it’s done! Your assay works. That single moment of joy and accomplishment makes the struggle of 2 months worth it. There’s no question, you’ve accomplished something. On to the next experiment with a little more confidence.

Things to come

GAATTC — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 18:54:08 +0000

A sign of a new day, or is it the sign that it’s Friday. The bench is clean, media is made: YPD, Cornmeal, and Serum! I love the site of a clean bench in the afternoon. Organization is in the eye of the beholder. Plates are where they need to be! The equipment is there, solutions waiting, with research to be completed on Monday. Some where, I’m sure there’s a poem to be written about all of this.

With a tightening economy, grants fewer and far between, a faster pace, and the ever increasing need for PI’s to publish, I’m extremely excited to be here. With a constant strain on the world of soft money, any research has to know how valuable it is to have an opportunity to contribute. If you’re a researcher, we’d love to hear about what you do. The DC area has a great community out there. I know it’s waiting to be found. Drop us a line. Shoot us a link to a picture of your bench. We just might publish it!

Western world.

GAATTC — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 14:30:43 +0000

We switched gears to look briefly at levels of protein expression. I’m enjoying the change of techniques. It’s been years since I’ve done protein work, and I like it! This time around we’re using HRP and a camera system to detect the signal from ECL. I do have to say, it makes me miss my days with alkaline phosphatase based detection. We have the HRP antibodies already, so that’s the direction we must go! None the less, it’s still quite fun! The anticipation waiting for those bands to appear on the screen.

Growing cells.

GAATTC — Fri, 21 May 2010 15:00:13 +0000

It’s a day of growth. Growing cells for RNA extraction for production of cDNA for use on micro arrays. Freezing down strains for lab maintenance. A good day. What’s your day in the lab like today?

GAATTC — Fri, 14 May 2010 20:34:52 +0000

So what do you think? Is this a sign? We could be part Neanderthal.. Oh there are so many off color comments to be made.

Neanderthals mated with some modern humans after all and left their imprint in the human genome, a team of biologists has reported in the first detailed analysis of the Neanderthal genetic sequence. The biologists, led by Svante Paabo of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, have been slowly reconstructing the genome of Neanderthals, the stocky hunters that dominated Europe until 30,000 years ago, by extracting the fragments of DNA that still exist in their fossil bones. Just last year, when the biologists first announced that they had decoded the Neanderthal genome, they reported no significant evidence of interbreeding.
NYtimes Link

Science Family?

GAATTC — Thu, 13 May 2010 18:22:39 +0000

How many of you feel like you develop a science family. I’m approaching 10 years at the same academic institution, and I feel like my department and previous departments are definitely part of a family. We know each other and we have a relationship. If we need to borrow something or talk our way through experiments, your neighbors are there for you. That’s really a great feeling. I’m curious if that’s just my institution, of if you’ve run into that too. Is it a universal academic trend?

Media… Media… Media…

GAATTC — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 16:47:33 +0000

It’s a day of making media prepping for tomorrow’s phenotype studies. Life is wonderful with one sleeve of plates. I remember the days of my first job in a local contract lab where I had to make 25 to 30 Liters worth of plates along with a great deal of tubes of broth for Antimicrobial Dilution Studies.

How many of you have produced media for a living? What was your job like?

Again!

GAATTC — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 16:08:37 +0000

Yes, that’s the life style of the lab, evaluate your work, and then repeat. Back to the bench to make more RNA with a few slight revisions to the protocol. Science is a lifestyle with constant change. It’s tough, but you keep pushing, and results will come. We’re still excited by the phase lock gel tubes that we’ve been using. Cheers to 5′ for a good product. I am curious though if we can push the limit of the volume of the phenol/chloroform sample.

We would still love to hear some feed back about your experience with research and the out look of the future career paths of DC metro area researchers. There’s a ton of activity in the area. Hit us with an email so we can learn more about your experiences finding biotech jobs, plans for the future, or stores about how you got where you are.