Dundee Research Interest Group

It has been 2 weeks since my last blog and I have now been working at MRC PPU for 1 month and I am really getting into the rhythm of life as a research scientist. The lab is proving to be an incredibly exciting place to work: I am surrounded with people performing innovative experiments, challenging existing concepts and finding answers to the questions that no one else is asking. It is a great privilege to be part of this inspiring community.

Over the last two weeks I have gained confidence in many of the basic techniques used regularly in the lab, one of the most fundamental being western blotting. This is a technique used to detect specific proteins within a sample and is integral to the work undertaken in Professor Miratul Muqit’s lab in the investigation of Parkinson’s disease. We employ this technique to study the levels and activity of specific proteins that are implicated in the pathology of Parkinson’s such as PINK1 and Parkin. I have now been able to independently perform several of my own western blot experiments, replicating some of the work of my lab ‘buddy’. Now that I have successfully reproduced my buddy’s results, I am hoping to commence my own project within the next week. This feels like a big but exciting step forward and, hopefully, I will be able to place one piece of the giant jigsaw that our lab is trying to put together.

Alongside starting my new project there remains a vast array of other techniques I need to learn. Currently, I am working on tissue culture, which is essentially growing cells which can then be used as models for Parkinson’s disease. Culturing cells is a bit like having a plant to tend for, they need to be fed regularly and transferred to bigger plates when they grow, the only difference being that cells are much more sensitive. The conditions for growing cells are highly stringent, sterility is of upmost importance and different types of cells can also require their own unique treatments. Tissue culture is a mastery that I hope I can become a successful apprentice in.

At the end of a month I am amazed by the amount of learning and hands-on work I have been able to do in such a short amount of time. This has made me really optimistic that over the next 9 months I will really be able to contribute something valuable to the work going on in MRC PPU… how exciting!