A note from the lab

The last four weeks have been rewarding in terms of achieving various milestones in my training. By the end of September, the malaria gene sequences I had been working on were complete and I established some interesting  findings from most of these gene sequences. The proteins they code are unique and hopefully at some point in the future we will use them for experimental evaluation for finding new ways to treat this devastating disease. The beauty of bioinformatics is that it gives you direction to move and to raise questions that can be evaluated experimentally.  Joseph [CDPC Education Officer] introduced to  me Thomas Dunne; he is a young lad who mined the malaria gene sequences that I had been working on. He had also created his own program which aided him when mining for these sequences. It was astonishing that at such a tender age he could develop a program to solve a problem; I now appreciate how innovation is born. I have been taking up the challenge and have my copy of Python and have begun learning to program, although I am taking baby steps so far! There are numerous bioinformatics tools available for this type of work, but occasionally you need a boutique-like program to facilitate some specific gene comparison. 

We met up with Dr. James McInerney to go through the sequence I had worked on and to get a feel as to whether I had been moving in the right direction. James is a guru of bioinformatics in Ireland! The meeting was very positive so it gave me great confidence in the work I had been doing.  I also had the  opportunity to head out to UCD for a conference, which was really exciting as some of the presentations contained a lot of what I had been learning with Noel.  One interesting thing was how the molecular aspects of the experiments were embedded with the protein characterization. Every single presentation had protein assays; mainly a method called a western blot. Once back at NUI Maynooth, Dr. Martina Schroeder was kind enough to to train me on how to carry out western blots. For the last two weeks I have been working with Hepatitis C core proteins and various mutants of it, and expressing the protein in the cells, then using the proteins expressed for the western blot assays. Not only have I learnt to do western blots, I have become pretty good at it! Hopefully the fourth year lads, Dan and Ray, can utilize the proteins I characterized for their projects.  Ruth, (one of Martina's postgraduate students) was always there to give a helping hand whenever I needed it. Beside being great at her work she is the best story teller! I can't help myself from bursting out laughing while listening to her numerous narratives. 

Roisin, Martina and James at an Immunology poster session

Working under Martina was absolutely fantastic. She is not only a great scientist but a wonderful teacher. I feel extremely privileged to have worked with her, I envy Ruth and Anthony who will be working with her for the next three years. I'm sure they'll learn loads! From Martina's lab, I carry the ethos of hardwork, efficiency and always being  economical with whatever you're using are engrained in me. If any of these values had ever been missing in my life I am sure they are now properly etched!

Unfortunately I have not been able to go sightseeing this month as I have had a lot on my plate. Hopefully I'll get spare some time to go to the countryside before I return home. The weather has turned on its head - its extremely cold, especially the nights.