The New Lecture

Achy and Tess

Today I woke up very happy knowing that is Friday and the weekend is here. I got done with my first week of my course and it was a rough week, but I have learned a lot in my class. I have two more weeks to go, but these two weeks coming up is going to be more challenging because it would be more work for me, well that’s what Achy has told the class. As I got up from my bed and got ready for my class, I was thinking what Achy have prepare for today class. When I got done getting ready, I went down to the Dining Hall to go eat breakfast. 

Getting Self Serve

My Lunch

I finished eating breakfast and then I started walking to my class. When I got to class I took my laptop out of my backpack and started typing for my journal. When the hour was over at 10 PM, I emailed Achy my journal because every Friday we need to send it to her; is part of our grade. I thought we were going to work on our workshop of the essays about our opposite, but instead, she gave us a whole different lecture about the elements to build a good. In order for this to work, you need to ignore the first draft. It has to be used after the first draft because then you have to ask question about: who is the POV? Where does it take place? When does it take place? Then the character has to have a desire, but it must be deep and real, something he really wants. When the character has a desire it needs to have an obstacle because if it doesn't have an obstacle the reader won’t have the enthusiasm to keep reading the book. The obstacle has to be realistic and it can’t be any obstacle that you can solve in minutes. It has to be an obstacle that you need a plan to solve the obstacle. It can be a person, society, your health, and addiction or any kind of obstacle that takes time to solve the problem. If the obstacle is easy, than it would not be a real obstacle. It has to explain what the POV character wants and what is in his way. Then, we execute the plan, meaning, what actually happens when the plan is put into action. The tricky thing that blew me off is that the plan always has to fail because then we will know the true colors of the character. After each failure we need to evaluate and repeat the steps over and over again. Achy told us that each failure makes the problem worst. I think this was very helpful because I never knew that a story have to have this. She gave us this lecture because later on in the course we have to write a story about anything we want. Then she let us out of class for the whole day at 11:30, but we need to watch a Star Wars movie because the movie uses this method a lot. Make a plan, execute, fail, and do it all over again. I wish we only needed to watch the movie, but we have to take notes on every scene of the movie and write who are the characters, the plan, the execution, and how did it fail.

Who wants pizza?

Then, I went to the gym with Vicky for the second time. We stayed in the gym from 5 PM to 6:30 PM. I went to work out my legs and Vicky went to go play a scrimmage basketball game with five other guys that go to play basketball every day at 4:30 PM. When we left the gym, we came straight to the Dining Hall to see if it was still open because they supposedly close at 6:30 PM, but when we got there it was still open and letting students go in. Later, Dani and Oyin came in and join us at the table me and Vicky we eating at. Then we were talking about their classes and how late they got out from class. Oyin got out at 5 PM and Dani at 6 PM. Oyin told us that when she got to her room that she went straight to sleep and took a nap. Dani was barely coming out from her class when she came to join us. I was very surprised because I thought they were going to get out early today. Then, I thought to myself that I was really lucky that Achy let us out at 11:30 AM.

Then we were planning to go to see the popular bean in Chicago but it was too late already. The girls wanted to go watch a movie, but we didn't know what was the closes theater at and plus it was getting late, so we ended up staying in the campus. Dani brought her computer and put on a movie on Netflix. Then I started to get hungry, so I order pizza. That’s how we ended up our night a Netflix movie with pizza.

Our HD Plasma TV.

Painting with Fluorescent Proteins

The lecture was so much better today! It was certainly easier to understand Dr. Bhasin now that she has slowed down. Also, after Dr. Bhasin’s talk to us yesterday about asking questions anytime during class, everyone felt more comfortable asking her to clarify certain terms and processes.

We then had our discussion about our latest reading material—The Alternative Genome. We talked about how alternative splicing increases diversity, how alternative splicing evolved, the genetic modifications that come from splicing regulation, and more. We learned how corn has 40,000 genes, yet humans have less than 25,000. Some people had positive views on this—they believed it showed how developed we are as human beings. However, other people had more of a bleak outlook on this. They talked about how slightly degrading it is to have less genes than a plant.

Another picture of our lab

We discussed alternative splicing and its benefits, RNA therapy, introns, exons, and spliceosomes. I found the discussion interesting, as well as the discoveries scientists are making in alternative splicing that could improve our lives.

We then moved on to our lab protocol quiz, which was difficult (as the quizzes sadly usually are). Barely anyone knew the answers to any of the questions, despite having studied for a large amount of time. However, Danny went over the answers after the quiz, which helped us in the lab afterwards.

Our lab today involved transforming E. coli with rainbow fluorescent proteins. Because most of the lab steps required waiting while incubating our proteins, the class had time to watch funny science-related videos. Danny and Ciara (her name is spelled this way and I didn’t know until today!) showed us the video last session’s Biotech class made, a parody of “Single Ladies” (titled “Single Threads, Put a Base on It”). We watched a parody of “Let It Go” by a group of students going through their residency and videos made in the 80’s about PCR.

Maria and Alex, our benchmates

Danny and Ciara told us how we’d get extra credit if we all film a video like last session’s “Single Threads, Put a Base on It.” Our class all agreed that we’d do something like that (the words “extra credit” are good motivation). Though the tense atmosphere in our class has lessened, most of us still don’t know each other and this would be a great way to become friends (which is most likely the point of it).

Our lab station

The lab was really relaxed. People talked and laughed with each other over the music someone played on their phone. I’m glad I don’t find lab stressful anymore.

After transforming our proteins, we took LB/Amp plates (which acted as our canvases) and painted on them using purple, yellow, pink, and blue fluorescent proteins. I painted a jellyfish, but I’m not sure how they’ll come out after I accidentally punctured the agar.

An example of what our plates might look like

At the end of the lab, our class stayed to attend the exam review Danny and Ciara held. The candy (which they passed out if you answered a question), relaxed atmosphere, and easy to follow information made the extra two hours after class more than worthwhile. Though I was tired by the end of the day, that exam review gave me hope that I can do well on the exam. I feel insanely better prepared now.

The moment I’ve been waiting for this whole week—the weekend! Though I still have to study and do homework, I’m definitely going to take advantage of these two days to socialize, do laundry, and relax.

Our First Friday

Because my cohort had such long night last night, we began our homework and blogging at ten after the alumni dinner; I woke up earlier than usual. I woke up giving myself just enough time to get dressed and grab breakfast. Instead of going to the dining halls, Oyin, Victoria, and I went to the campus bookstore to grab a coffee and a quick snack before heading to class.

 Today in class we learned about the relationship between an infant and a caregiver. Children can form attachments with their primary caregivers in many different ways. The type of relationship that has been formed can be shown in an experiment called the Strange Situation. In Strange Situation, a child is shown an unfamiliar room with a caregiver, and then the caregiver goes away, and later comes back. One of the most common forms of attachments seen is a secure attachment. This is seen in a little above 60% of the children who were in the Strange Situation studies, and it is characterized by the child feeling safe to explore the room if they are with their caregiver. Once this caregiver figure leaves the room, the infant will react very negatively, but will be soothed quickly when the caregiver returns to the room. Another main category children are placed into based off of their reactions, is the insecure attachment. This can be subcategorized into insecure/ambivalent, and insecure/avoidant. These are not worse than secure attachments because they usually just lead to differences in personality traits later in life and relationships later in life. An insecure/ambivalent attachment is characterized by a child’s indifference when the primary caregiver leaves and their lack of reaction when the caregiver returns. An insecure/avoidance attachment can be seen when a caregiver returns after having left, and the infant turns away from the caregiver and may avoid them. There is one last category. This category is called the disorganized reaction. In this case, when the parent re-enters the room, the child will stop what it is doing, or seem to be taking an unusually long time deciding how they will react. This reaction is common in kids who have been treated badly by the caregiver, or whose caregiver is afraid of them. This reaction can be seen in maltreated children or the children of teenage parents. 

Another aspect of the mother child relationship is how much emotional care and attention children really need. Of course to survive, children need food, so the fact that their mother provides them with food covers that need. But mothers also can provide children with a sense of security and social interaction, and it is possible that babies cannot develop in a healthy manner fully without that aspect of care giving. We also learned about emotion in infants, which were mainly frustration and anger, sadness, and shame and guilt, which appear much later in a child’s development. It has been suggested that the smiling in infants, a social smile that appears a few months after birth, has a very biological purpose. If the infant smiles at the mother, or other primary caregiver, the caregiver will feel special to the infant and therefore want to continue caring and providing for the infant, which is necessary for the infant to survive.

 After lunch, we came back to the class room and worked on our papers by searching for research papers that could support our reasons for choosing the experiment that we did. At this point, the class was having a sort of self-dismissal. If students felt they had gotten enough done in class, they would leave. I made a substantial amount of progress on finding research papers we, my group, could cite in our own papers, so I left and went to the gym for a while. Later I met my cohort for an early dinner in the dining hall. Later we watched some movies and hung out in the dorm lounges. It was nice to be able to spend time doing activities without having to worry about getting up early the next day or having to work on homework for the next day. 

Ratner Athletic Facility

Tomorrow we are all planning to go downtown and spend some time in the city while we have the opportunity to do so.

The Amazing Beach Experiment

My day in class was very interesting and educational at the same time. This morning I got a caramel Frappuccino and was on my way to class. I actually ran into Dani and Kaitlyn while going into our building. For class we had an hour lecture and then we were on our way to get samples from Lake Michigan. It wasn’t a very long walk but I think we took the long way there because the way it was described was that it’s close to the dorms. At the beach we took samples of the water so that we could extract the bacteria out of the water. But first the lecture talked about the biology of viruses and the characteristics they have. I learned that they are non-cellular, they have particles called virons, and sometimes classified as non-living. Viruses have no genes for respiration and protein synthesis. Viruses must infect host cell to replicate/ make copies. I also learned that viral proteins carry the information for the synthesis of a number of viral proteins. So back to the beach, we all walked into the water and got our water samples from the lake using 50 mL tubes. Our professor let us stay at the beach for the rest of the time remaining before lunch. I chose to go back to the dorms and eat while everyone else ate at The Med restaurant. At lunch I bought some subway and then walked back to my class building where I waited for everyone to get back because I was the only one at class on time. Class didn’t start until 1:30 because everyone else was coming from The Med restaurant.

In the lab today, as I said before, we extracted the bacteria from the samples by using a funnel apparatus and a filter pad took all of the bacteria out of the water. Then we put m-ColiBlue24 into a plate before we put the filter pad on top of the plate with m-ColiBlue24. After, we got bacteria from anywhere by choice and put it on a TSA plate and waited. My partner Sophia and I chose to get bacteria from someone’s table they were currently using, a bathroom doorknob, and a dead fish. We used saline to mix all of the bacteria before putting it on the TSA plate. The purpose of this lab was to identify coliform in the water.

After class Jimmy and I met Alexa at the gym to work out at 4:45 PM. We split off into different places. I went the basketball gym to play against some people there, Jimmy went to go lift weights, and Alexa did some running and biking. At the basketball gym I meet new people every time. Today I met Noah, Sani, and Veroon. They actually are taking college courses as well but unfortunately Sani is leaving so I didn’t get to hang out with him while he was here. After playing a basketball game with them I went to the weight room to lift weights with Jimmy again. Luckily we finished in time to get dinner. We later saw Oyin, Dani, and Alexa. For dinner I had fruit and a beef quesadilla. Later we departed for a short time so that we could hang out in the west lounge to watch some movies and eat pizza around 10 PM. Then we all had gone to Alexa’s room to finish up some work and then go to bed in our rooms.

T.G.I.F.

Salvador Giving His Presentation

Today was our first Friday of the program and, to say the least, I was really happy to see this day. One of my class mates, Salvador, gave us a presentation on an invention of his which involves reworking disposable diapers to make them more sustainable. Disposable diapers are one of the top contributors to waste landfill and this is because diapers are made of mostly petrolatum derived materials like super absorbent polymers that make the diapers more absorbent. Salvador's idea was to replace this super absorbent polymer with sugar cane bagasse. He tested out this strategy and it worked really well. I think that his idea is incredible and that it has the potential to make a huge difference environmentally. I also think that it is really mind blowing that somebody my age could accomplish something like that.

Working With My Partner Ziang

The rest of the morning went by really fast as we reviewed topics that we learned over the week and we looked a little bit ahead. We had our lunch assignment which was to do a power point on the life cycle analysis of different products, my partner and I had to do it on a computer. Once we got those done, we presented them for the class. This took more time than our professor thought it would so we moved our book discussion to Monday and we watched a movie in class instead. The movie was called Carbon Nation and it was about the different ways that communities are coming up with different ways to solve the carbon emission problems and reduce the ecological footprint. What really stuck out to me was that a Richmond, California community member was getting the word out about solar panels in his town and he stared an organization where homes could get solar panels and they would be installed by people who lived in Richmond, creating jobs for them. I was surprised to see that something like this was available and especially since it is so close to home.

Movie Time

After we watched the movie, we were let out of class. My professor decided to let us enjoy our weekend so she didn't give us any assignments. I was really thankful for this because my first week of class felt really long and hectic as I tried to balance school work with fun time. When I got back to my dorm room after class, the first thing that I did was take a nap. I felt like if I didn't take that nap, I would have crashed sometime later in the day. After my nap, I went to dinner with my cohort and we decided to have a light night so we just watched movies and ate pizza together. We decided that tomorrow afternoon, we would go into the city and explore Chicago.

Dinner with Chicago Alumni

I am now somewhat getting used to my early morning schedule. I woke up a little later this morning since now I know how long it takes me to do everything. I headed down for breakfast, which I ate with Catherine, Eugenia, and Cookie, all girls from my psychology class. We all walked together psychology class together and prepared our materials for the class. Yesterday, Cassie had told us that today’s class would be a little easier than previous classes because we would be looking at many videos instead of just lectures.

Today for the first half of class extensively reviewing the textbook readings we had done the night before. The chapter focused on the physical and cognitive development in infancy. Babies learn in all different ways. Sometimes they learn by watching what adults and caregivers around them do actions, which they then try to copy. This is called imitation, and it does not always happen immediately. An infant or child can keep an observed action in their brains for days or weeks before they actually even try and do it for themselves. Another kind of learning babies do is called conditioning. This is where every time a baby does something there is a reaction. Eventually the baby comes to expect this reaction, or conditioned to expect it. An example of this would be if every time a baby drops a spoon off of its feeding table, it hears a clatter. Eventually these two will associate in the child’s mind and the child will expect a clatter the next time it drops a spoon. We went over concepts like this for the first half of class to really make sure these ideas were set in our minds.

We broke for lunch, which unfortunately, was not as long as our lunch yesterday. I ate lunch with the same people I ate breakfast with, but I also met up with Victoria, who sat with us. We didn’t get to stay long before having to head back to class. To start out the second half of class, Cassie started out with a difficult question to discuss. Do young infants think? At first I thought, “Yes, of course”, and apparently so did every one of my peers. When we took a poll, all sixteen of the students said that babies did think. The professor and TA both said no. We had very different definitions of thinking. It was described as conscious and rational judgment. This really changed how I thought about the question, because if it made me question if babies thought consciously. Eventually my arguments ended up supporting the idea that babies do not judge consciously and rationally until much, much later in their development. I thought about the fact that all the information that we have about babies thinking and learning is coming from an outside stimuli. This then made me wonder, if no information was being shown to them or processed, would they be able to form a conscious though on their own? I thought no. Cassie then told us that this question is not one that can be or has been answered. We then watched multiple videos on how babies learn and the different methods they use. After the videos we did some more group planning for our final project.

After class, I thought I would have to hurry to the dorms and change for the dinner, but it turned out that we planned to go a little later than expected. At first I was going to take a nap, but Victoria asked me if I wanted to go to the gym with her and I was up for it. When we got to the gym she wanted to play some pick-up basketball games, and I wanted to do some cardio, so we agreed to meet up at the entrance at a certain time and then leave. The gym is really nice, and hopefully over the weekend I will be able to go a couple more times before the new week starts and I am busy again.

On our way to dinner, we saw a tap dancer with an onlooker. The kid was also trying to tap dance, an example of imitation

The dinner we had was at Capitol Grille in Downtown Chicago. The students and admissions officers arrived shortly after us. Peter and Troy were the admissions officers and I talked mostly to them since I was sitting near them. The students were Eric, Lily, Leilani, and Teddy. Troy, one of the admissions officers who traveled out to California said he remembered that one person from ECHS was going to U Chicago, who I quickly figured out was Simon Cohen. He also talked about his experience at U Chicago and how he first thought he was interested in history, but was then later inspired by his professors to take an interest in economics. This dinner was different than the others since we already had much more of an idea of what U Chicago is like before the dinner.

The food was delicious out. Since the grille specialized in steaks, I decided to order the filet mignon with wild mushrooms and onions. It was absolutely delicious, but also extremely filling. For desert I chose a flourless espresso cake. It definitely kept me awake to finish my homework when we got back to the dorms from the restaurant. 

Tomorrow is Friday and I cannot wait to start my first weekend here at U Chicago.

UChicago Alumni Dinner

Our lecture today was very in-depth, as usual. Dr. Bhasin had a lot of new information to tell us about recombinant technology and DNA cloning. She lectured and expounded on cDNA and genomic libraries, blue-white screening, and vectors, among other things.

Her lecture was, as usual, challenging. After a while she had us all get up and stretch or do jumping jacks so we’d feel energized (which worked).

Oh, labs. After the first day struggling with the microscopes, I thought I would end up hating labs, but I surprisingly really enjoy them. The pre-lab quizzes are definitely something else, though. I read the lab protocol, but I’m still not sure how I did on that quiz. I have to admit, though, that pre-lab quizzes do help in understanding the labs (so I guess they’re worth it).

April in lab

Before our actual lab started, Dr. Bhasin had a talk with us about the lecture portion of the class. Apparently Danny (one of our TAs) talked to multiple students and found out that most of us think the lectures go too fast. Dr. Bhasin had whoever thinks her lectures were fast-paced raise their hand and almost all hands went up! She agreed to go slower and told us not to be shy in voicing our questions—she wants to help us learn as much as we can in this class, she said.

I like how encouraging Dr. Bhasin is, but it’s intimidating to ask questions in a room with smart students who most likely already know the answer. I also think that everyone in the class (and also the program) are used to being the “smart kids” at our schools, so speaking up in class and running the risk of being the “stupid kid” is a difficult transition (not that speaking up makes anyone “stupid”). I wonder how tomorrow’s lecture will be like.

Today we were able to do gel electrophoresis! Though some people in my class have already done it before, it was my first time, so I found it exciting (and also slightly nerve-racking—I didn’t want to mess up everyone else’s gel).

Centrifuge

Nanodrop

First, April and I prepped our plasmid. We isolated the DNA of the E. coli through alkali lysis—we added lysis buffer and neutralization buffer, then spun the tube in the centrifuge (also my first time and also very cool). After adding the low salt elution buffer, running the centrifuge, and calculating the purity of our isolated plasmid DNA through Nanodrop, we were free to get lunch, empanadillas at a food truck.

Afterwards, we finally were able to do gel electrophoresis. I pipetted our plasmid into the gel, and it turned out well! When we looked at the results later, Dr. Bhasin commented on how April and I did well. I’m glad we’re not so clueless anymore.

Finally, our cohort was able to go to the alumni dinner. We met Eric, Leilani, Lily, and Teddy students at UChicago), as well as Troy and Peter, UChicago admissions officers.

They all told us about their many extracurricular activities (anything you’re interested in, they have), the traditions they hold (like Scav, a scavenger hunt people take seriously—there have been miming, bootstrap-inventing, jellyfish-wearing, and baby teeth-mailing involved), the food (like the desserts and fourth meal option they have [which would be great to have now too] as well as the food trucks), and great places to visit in Chicago (like Hyde Park, Lincoln Park Zoo, Millennium Park).

They also told us about their experiences with the professors we now have. Eric told me how he had Dr. Bhasin for biology and that she was good and encouraging, but mentioned that in his experience, her tests can include anything she’s even very briefly commented on. I don’t know if her tests are like that during the summer sessions, but Eric (after seeing my horrified expression, no doubt) assured me that I’ll be fine. I hope so—my first exam is this Monday!

They told us why they chose and now love UChicago, too. Leilani said she visited and fell in love with the people, place, and sense of community. She said that she loves the different kinds of extracurricular activities she can do, how UChicago is so close to a great city, and how the houses in the dorms really gives everyone a second home and sense of community.

Eric, Teddy, and Leilani told us how they found that sense of community within their house. You see, at UChicago you’re put into a dorm that’s split into different “houses” (or communities of people). After speaking with alumni from the dinner in SF all those weeks ago and talking to students and alumni now, I’ve found out that your housemates are and will stay your best friends.

Teddy and Eric told us about house rivalries, how much they love the school, funny stories about their experience at UChicago so far (Eric was once completely buried in snow), house traditions (wearing ugly Christmas sweaters), house events (Lily’s watched Wicked, Phantom, Yo-Yo Ma, and other shows with her house), and really nice people they’ve met at UChicago (people in the Dining Commons who saved Leilani peanut butter ice cream, etc.).

The night passed by really quickly. It had to be one of the—if not the—best dinner I’ve attended. I’ve noticed how the people we’ve met at UChicago are slightly more charismatic and relaxed than the majority of other students and alumni we’ve met. It was such a fun dinner. I can already tell how fun and quirky (as Elspeth and others at our first dinner said) people at UChicago must be.

Literally one of the best coconut cream pies I've ever had

I asked Peter and Troy if the college courses I’ve taken at CCC will be credited, and they said there’s definitely a good chance they’ll be credited, though it depends on our professors.

I am considering applying to this school, though I don’t know how I feel about their Common Core program requiring students to take certain classes for the first two years of their college career.

Back on campus after the dinner

I’ll end by sharing two pieces of advice Leilani gave me: 1, show admissions officers your personality! In the end, without your personality shining through your essay, you’re just numbers and grades, and 2, don’t worry about moving from California to the Midwest! Don’t let anyone make you think moving to the Midwest from California is a bad idea.

They gave us UChicago gear! Thank you so much!