I am applying to SUNY Stony Brook's Honor program and they ask you to respond to the prompt: Evaluate a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken, or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you. I wrote about working as a lab assistant under Wakshlag in the oncology lab at Cornell University's College of Veterinary Medicine.
I'd taken quite a few science classes, before I worked in Dr. Wakshlag's lab, but I had never 'done' science.
In science class, you're given a lab, which 200,000 other students complete every year. In Dr. Wakshlag's lab, it was different. The research I was doing was applicable, practical, and original. It's an incredible feeling to have somebody ask you to figure out a problem, not because they know the answer and want to see if you can get it right, but because they don't know the answer and they genuinely want to see what want you find out.
In the Oncology lab, everything moved faster, but rather than scare me away, it made me want to learn more. It was more interesting and more in-depth than anything I had previously been exposed to. For the first time, I really felt challenged and I was better because of it. I would go in to the lab for seven hours a day and come home wanting to learn more; I'd look up the things that they had mentioned to try to understand them. Every day was a new opportunity and a new lesson.
My main project in the lab was to sequence the canine RUNX3 gene. Mutations in the RUNX3 gene lead to canine osteoporosis and understanding the gene's sequence is another step towards treating the disease.
It wasn't an easy task. The canine RUNX3 gene had never been sequenced before and I had to innovate and make it up as I went along. To give you an idea of how hard it was, my RNA primers had to 23-25 letters long, each letter had four possibilities, the order mattered, and I had to make a start and finish primer, so there were approximately 73 trillion combinations. I used the mouse and chimpanzee RUNX3 gene sequences as a starting point, but to say the least it was a long shot.
That's how real science is done though, it takes hundreds of trials to confirm anything and even then you might realize the phenomena you were looking for doesn't exist. Perseverance is key though; it's that one discovery that'll change the scientific communities understanding, that you have to keep fighting for.
Even though I wasn't able to sequence the gene in the couple of months I was there, I learned a lot. Like Edison reportedly stated, "I have not failed 1,000 times. I have successfully discovered 1,000 ways not to make a light bulb."
While at the lab, I learned how to run PCR and gel electrophoresis, grow bacteria cultures, prepare media, create Southern blots, design primers, use PubMed, micropipette, produce acrylamide gels, centrifuge, and weigh. More important than any of the literal skills I learned, I developed a new way of thinking and looking at problems.
Working in the lab taught me to how to self-sufficient, take initiative, and look at problems from multiple viewpoints. I didn't have somebody telling me what to do every step of the way; I had to discover for myself what the next step was. It taught me how connect all the pieces and pay attention to details. It humbled me and taught me to take meticulous and copious notes. More than anything, working in the lab taught me that research is my calling and it's what I want to pursue as a career in the future.
Thank you for any of you comments!
