Watch Out for That Wave!

The second week of the internship was a blur. Though I was acclimated to the lab and knew what I was going to be working on, there was so much more to do than I expected. If you are a person who loves training, then this is definitely the field for you. I do not mean learning how to use machines and lab equipment; I mean reading paragraph after paragraph about different safety protocols and regulations. Granted, it was interesting at times and definitely gave me a better understanding of the how the lab worked, but man was there a lot of it. Besides training, my second week consisted of learning more procedures; this time I learned how to seed cells for a clonogenic assay. Basically, I took cells from flasks and put them on a six well plate. I'll provide pictures of a flask and clonogenic assay in a later post.

One of the most exciting part of the week was going to the Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale to have the cells irradiated. The irradiator is located in one of the research buildings on the left side of the hospital. Operating the machines is fairly straightforward. Since lead is build into it we did not have to wear personal protective equipment or go to another room. We did wear gloves for precautionary reasons, but the process was simple. Dr. Lacombe placed the cell plate in the respective place and the radiation technician, Kevin, inputed the number of seconds the cells would be needed to irradiated to get the correct dosage (2Gy, 4Gy, 6Gy, 8Gy, or 10Gy) and turned on the X-rays. Though we were there for only 30 minutes, it was exciting to be able to witness the process and helped me to better understand what the project was about.

All in all, my second week was still an informative week for me. I continued to learn the ropes of the lab and learned what to do and what not to do. For example, when pipetting use your dominant hand not your non-dominant hand just because the person who taught you uses that hand. Other than being hit with a tsunami of training, my second week was a fun one.