Bit off more than I can chew STEM! Goodbye for Winter, Merry Christmas and a New Year!

These past few weeks have been probably the most stressed I've ever been in my life........SO FAR, that is. As the saying goes I believe I bit off more than I can chew this semester which includes my four classes, this internship, and a new full time job. YEAH, FULL TIME! I over estimated myself and thought I could get through this like a piece of cake, but I was unfortunately mistaken. I've been going to class then internship and to work right after most of the days from the week and I was fine the first week but I started to feel the toll and the work started to pile up. I am very glad this semester is coming to an end and hopefully do great on my finals this and next week. I will like to wish everyone good  luck on the final paper and presentations tomorrow and a MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR! I'm fortunately going to be spending new years in LAS VEGAS with my girlfriend's family (visiting family, not for a hangover trip) have a nice break everyone and hopefully see most of you guys when we come back.

The Last Few Weeks of my First Semester......yaaaaaaay

So the end is near. Only a few weeks left of this 2013 fall semester and it's been filled with a lot of learning and a lot of new people. Oh yeah, and a whole lot of homework!! Being in this STEM internship program has been AWESOME so far I met a lot of new people and I learned a lot from identifying bacterias and learning how to make media plates. I know there is so much more to learn here and to do, I can't wait for the projects to start next semester if I get chosen to come back (fingers crossed). I really hope I do come back  because I wish to learn more! I need more of Jedi Josh and Matt's knowledge, but in all seriousness I really have enjoyed this semester and has been a great first one and wish to spend more in this program. I am currently very busy with research papers and presentations due next week combined with working so its kind of hectic.

Sampling 101, Instructor Darren Johnson

This week Darren was nice enough to show me the process of making these smaller TSA plates for sampling and how to actually sample for bacteria. This is crucial for my project because I will be looking for Staph aureus in Phoenix College's gym and maybe other places around campus and sampling is necessary. I also want to do something more with Staph aureus but I really do not have any idea what yet, but I will do more research on the bacteria and will try to think of something interesting and creative to do with it. So Darren literally walked me through the process of how to make this medium which is trypticase soy agar. He first showed me how to measure the mix of TSA that comes in a powder stage in a bucket. I believe we did 20 grams and added those 20 grams to the 500ml of DI water which is Deionized water. We put them in a beaker and heated and mixed the powder TSA in until we were able to look through it. The next step was to put that beaker and another container to take medium out of in to the autoclave which sterilizes everything. Next Darren showed me the Bio-Safety cabinet and showed me how to clean it with alcohol. While we waited for the media in the autoclave to be done we went out sampling in the bathroom and right outside the bio-sciences department. We did 20 samples from the floors, elevator buttons, stair rails, door handles, anywhere people touched. The media's time in the autoclave was done and Kimberly was nice enough to take it out for us. Darren then showed me how to use a special pipette to put the media in the empty petri dishes. I did make some mistakes but it was my first time making TSA so cut me some slack. Here are some pictures of the process and results.

Museum Trip and The END to the unknowns

       This past Friday a group of STEM interns and Matt, Josh, Dijana and Anil (sorry if I got the name wrong) took a trip down to the National History Museum in Mesa in the awesome Phoenix College Van! The Museum was really cool and there were many interesting things there like dinosaurs skeletons, meteorites/asteroids, rocks, fossils, panning for gold, a cell, a maze through a mine! Many things to see and experience and it was really fun and I wanted to thank the STEM team for the trip and the delicious subway in the parking lot. It wasn't the best spot but it will do hopefully next time we have a better place to eat. Also if the next trip is to the brewery I'm unfortunately still under the age of 21 so no fair but I would still enjoy the trip. Here are some pictures for those who did not attend to enjoy.

        Finally I have identified the bacterias in my unknown. Josh had given me two bacterias in one broth. I did and oxidase test to the gram negative bacilli and it was negative, so I did a glucose fermentation and was also negative. On the gram positive cocci I did the catalase test and it was positive, glucose fermentation test and was also positive, finally a MSA test and again positive. The two bacterias were (Gram Positive Cocci) Staphylococcus aureus and (Gram Negative Bacilli) Enterbacter aerogenes. This is the end to the investigations of unknown bacterias for now but I will probably have to do these processes again in some Bio class but now I am prepared and I know what to do.

Rookie Mistake! Gram Negative AND Positive?

  

                                Gram Negative Bacilli                           Gram Positive Cocci

     This week I was trying to figure out what my new bacteria or actually bacterias were since I was given two bacteria in one broth medium. I did a gram stain on each bacteria and I was able to identify that I have a gram positive cocci and a gram negative bacilli in my unknown, with the help of Josh and the use of oil on the microscope. Yet, I have committed a rookie mistake! When I inoculated some TSB with each bacteria I very foolishly forget to label which bacteria was which. I simply marked it bacteria #1 and #2 how silly of me to do. So now I have to re-do my process and stain them again next week which is a bummer because I want to start on my Staph aureus/MRSA project already! I've also been working on my article review which has been a bit troubling with the amount of vocabulary I do not understand and have to look up. Yet everything seems to be going well and I can't wait for the FIELD TRIP TOMORROW YAAAAY :)

Staphylococcus Aureus! New Project and Article Assignments

  Staphylococcus Aureus

This week in the internship I finally figured out what my #7 unknown bacteria was! It was Staphylococcus Aureus! My MSA came back with bacteria growing so it was MSA positive. I then tested my bacteria broth with the following broths: glucose, lactose, mannitol, tryptone, TSI(agar), and TSB+6.5NaCl(sodium chloride). All the results(color changes and bacteria growth) proved that my bacteria was in fact Staphylococcus Aureus. A very resistant bacteria to antibiotics that can be found in the respiratory tract and on the skin. Staph aureus can cause skin infections, respiratory disease like sinusitis, food poisoning, and possible life threatening diseases like: pneumonia, meningitis, osteomyelitis, endocartitis, and toxic shock syndrome(TSS). 

To the left you can see my test tubes after they spent 24 hours in the incubator with color changes to yellow and some bacteria growth in the TSI. To the right you can see my MSA medium with the bacteria growing in it. This proves that my bacteria was able to grow in a high salt environment. The yellow was what you were looking for here.        

 Isolated Streak (Notice the different kinds of Spots)

Now that I found out that my bacteria was Staphylococcus Aureus, Josh gave me an assignment to look up a few articles and type a review on one. The article I chose to review is called "Staphylococcus Aureus small colony variants are susceptible to light activated microbial agents" by Sarah Tubby. Michael Wilson, John A. Wright, Ping Zhang, and Sean P. Nair. So far it's very interesting because I'm learning why Staph aureus is so resistant to antibiotics and this new method that has potential to eliminate S. aureus. Oh, yeah and I was assigned a brand new bacteria to solve and test on. I have done an isolated streak and have done the gram stain so far but something very interesting was noticed by Josh on my isolated streak. It actually had two different types of bacteria growing in it! How weird! So Josh told me to test the both bacteria in TSB and incubate them. Well that's what I've done so far and hopefully next week I will figure out what it is. Also I'm really looking forward to the field trip this Friday to the Arizona Museum of Natural History even though I have class at that time. Hmm not really sure what to do, but I will figure something out!

First Week as Stem Intern! Unknown Bacteria "X" Mini Project

   This past week has been my first week as a STEM intern. I started Monday at noon and my journey began with some very long and informative safety videos. Although they were boring they are important and essential. After the videos I had to find out what an "isolation streak" and a "lawn streak" were. I then had to actually do an isolation and lawn streak with mystery bacteria #7 given to me by Josh. My first attempts on the streaks were not very good due to me literally stabbing the TSA. I tried it again and my second attempt were much better after Josh demonstrated how to do it properly. Drawing the “T” on the bottom of the dish really helped as well. I put my first and second attempts of streaks in the incubator for 24 hours to see my results.

These are my first and second attempts for the isolation streak. “T” definitely help

My second attempt (right) seemed to have grown some type of mold quite obviously.

On Tuesday I had to find out what a “gram stain” was and figure out how to do a gram stain on my unknown bacteria. So I found out that a gram stain is a way to figure out what type of cell wall (gram negative or gram positive) and shape the bacteria has to differentiate it from other bacteria to narrow down what type of bacteria it is. So the process was to grab a slide and put a drop of water on it. I then grabbed some bacteria and smeared it on the slide on the water. I got an oil lamp and heated the slide by passing it on top of the fire until the water dried up and left only the bacteria. After that I put a drop of crystal violet on the bacteria and left it for 30 seconds and rinsed it off with water. Next I covered the bacteria with Gram’s Iodine for one minute and rinsed. The decolorizer was next for 15-30 seconds and rinse. Last was the Safranin for about a minute and rinse off. Blot dry with the bibulous paper and finally put the slide under the microscope and look for the cell morphology. Mine turned out to be a gram positive coccus.

I had figured out that my cell morphology was coccus, which is circular shaped cells. I also found out through the gram stain that my unknown bacteria was gram positive since it was purple. From that information I followed the positive gram cocci chart and the next step was to do a catalase test. The catalase test purpose is to identify if the bacteria generates the enzyme catalase. I needed some hydrogen peroxide for this test. I grabbed a slide and made two circles one for the test and the other for control. I put a drop of distilled water on both circles and smeared some inoculum (bacteria). I put one or two drops of hydrogen peroxide on the Test circle and none on the control. The reason for this is to see if the hydrogen peroxide will make the bacteria bubble or not. If the bacteria does bubble then it means that it is catalase positive. The C circle is to compare with T circle.  My bacteria did bubble so it is catalase positive.

Now that the bacteria have been identified to have positive catalase enzymes, the next step is to do glucose fermentation. I simply transferred a few drops from by unknown bacteria tube to the glucose tube and put it in the incubator for 24 hours. The next day I grabbed my glucose tube from the incubator and saw that it turned bright yellow. This means that my bacteria is a positive acid and it did not produce any gas. Finally I did an MSA test today to see if my bacteria can withstand a high salt concentration environment. I did an isolated streak on an MSA medium today and placed it in the incubator for 24 hours. Next week I will check my results. Overall I have really enjoyed this mini project so far because it’s really “hands on” learning and it’s interesting to see how many test are done on a bacteria. The other interns seem really cool as well and seem to be enjoying their projects too.

First Week as a S-STEM Scholar, Human Chimeras

So this is my first week as a S-STEM Scholar and my first time doing a blog ever! I'm very excited to be a part of this STEM program and to be one of the scholars chosen this semester and I want to thank the STEM staff for choosing me. Well I don't have much to blog about this week but the internship interview I had on Monday with Josh and Matt. The interview was good and I hope I'm chosen to be an intern for the program. In the interview I was motivated to look into biological research and that's what I did. I found an interesting article about human chimeras. A chimera is a mythological term given to animals with other animals' parts like a lion with a snake for it's tail. Chimeras were only thought as these mythological creatures until recently as doctors are finding characteristics of chimeras in humans. This article states that there was a case of a mother that had recently given birth to a child but blood test showed that she was not the child's biological mother. She continued to take blood test but they soon found out that she was a fraternal twin and that the twin literally "absorbed into her" and the "combined tissue created a composite body". Another woman had the same problem when she needed a kidney from  her children but then found out they did not have her DNA. I found this article very interesting as I never imagined this ever happening and it's quite fascinating. There are links below to the the article.

http://io9.com/5911357/theres-a-good-chance-youre-a-human-chimera