Scientific Research
As a biology major, I was part of many research teams and presented at many symposiums throughout my college years. Here are some of my works that I'd like to share!
Did someone say... "birds"?!?
2018-2019
See published article in full here
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It was an honor to join Dr. Dana Moseley's new research team to study ornithology. This was a brand new field for me so I got the chance to learn a lot of new things and step outside of my comfort zone.
Her lab emphasized on the gray catbird, which are migratory songbirds that visit the Mid-Atlantic region from May to July. Catbirds, similar to mockingbirds, have songs that mimic surroundings. Throughout the year, we studied how the environment impacts the songs of the catbirds. This can be the repertoire, pitch, frequency, and length.
When the catbirds are in the area, we visit chosen field sites ranging from urban to rural to capture and band these birds as well as record more songs to analyze.
Our early hypothesis is that catbirds in urban environments are going to have a smaller repertoire and higher pitches due to lack of biodiversity and that they now have more noise to compete against in order to have mates hear their songs, such as car alarms, bells, construction noises, etc.
I co-presented this with our group's Master's student, Morgan Hussey, for the Spring 2018 Biology Symposium. The most interesting takeaway from here is the center bars - each black skid is a sound made from a catbird. Starting from rural at the top to urban at the bottom, we can see that it starts to get more and more crowded, meaning the song has more and more syllables.
The following year, I created and presented this at the Spring and Summer 2019 Biology Symposium by myself. Taking the study from last year one step further, I analyzed the different kinds of sounds catbirds made. Because we were still very early in our studies, I was only able to extract information from four catbirds.
My favorite part in this project was that the beauty was unmatched. I saw and experienced many things that I would've never done if I hadn't joined this research team. Everyday was an adventure, despite having to wake before the birds did.
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Fun fact: It's a myth that you can't touch baby birds due to mothers not coming back because of human scent.
We Weren't Expecting This One...
2019
Because I loved microbiology so much, I decided to take Bacterial Discovery which was lab-heavy and also taught bioinformatics and gene sequencing.
Our goal was to go out to collect Salmonella enterica from the local creek and identify and sequence it.
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We did not get Salmonella enterica.
Our class went out to local creeks and sewages to collect sediment samples.
We put raw samples into pre-enrichment broths and then plated and purified on XLT-4 and CHROM agar plates. After we were sure the sample was purely sample, we started running tests.
...lots of tests.
Gram and capsule stains (above)
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Kirby-Bauer resistance and Enterotube testing (below)
Lots of chemical tests and bioinformatics online (unpictured)
And it turns out we got Klebsiella pneumoniae!
AKA the bacteria that causes pneumonia.
