Labs
Lab writeups:
In the first lab we were oriented into lab work and norms. Got familiar with the concept of pippetting and introduced several different pippettes that will be helpful with transferring different liquid volumes.
Creating the gel: 1 part 50X TAE Electrophoresis 49 part deionized H2O 3g LE Agarose Pouring the gel into the well-molds: Designing the gel-run results in the web interface (It’s a space-invader holding a heart!): Preparing the pcr tubes with restriction enzymes, dna, CutSmart buffer & water:
This week’s lab was about getting familiar with cuttind-edge lab automation tools. We were introduced to the Opentron, which to me was a close relative to 3d printing hardware and other gantry based fabrication method. It runs on a python script indicating coordinates for the working head to go-to, and has a pump and a motor where you would imagine the filament extruder motor and the heating element to be in a standard FDM 3d printer. Really enjoyed using this cool device.
This week our lab was about the Gibson Assembly process. We edited an exisiting plasmid by fragmenting it and ‘stiching’ it back with a mutated fragment. Our goal was to introduce a mutation of the chromophore of amilCP - a purple chromoprotein originally from the coral Acropora millepora - to generate new color variants that would be expressed in E.Coli bacteria. We did so by using PCR primers that already had the color mutations incorporated, and assembled it into a plasmid containing the elements needed for replication and expression in bacteria. The plasmid was then transformed into E. coli so the cells grow and express the mutated protein.