Mod 3 thoughts, things that are awesome, and some thank yous

This post contains many feelings and a lot of cheesiness.  Probably more cheese than science, actually, but, personally, I think cheese and science pair quite nicely.

So, first off, I want to talk about why I wanted to be a biological engineer and why I wanted to come to MIT.  Because this story is excessively relevant to this module and I really just want to gush about cool things.

           

When I was a junior in high school, I was still kinda unsure of what I wanted to do with myself, besides just, ‘uh, well I like biology I guess…?”  But I still was pretty unfamiliar with things, and I was stressing about college entrance exams and having to apply to school in a year, the whole nine yards.  Around then is when I saw this program on NOVA called Making Stuff.  It was about materials science, and one of the episodes was specifically about biomaterials engineering.  A lot of big name people from MIT were on it including (you guessed it) Angela Belcher.  Now, I watched a lot of NOVA growing up, but this episode in particular struck a chord with me.  “Tissue engineering, phage display, observing nature and learning from it to build new materials?  People can do things like that?  This sort of innovation exists??  How to people even come up with this stuff, I want to do this!”  It just sounded awesome.

So, I ended up getting a volunteer position in a biomaterials lab because I happened to be good friends with a classmate whose dad ran a biomaterials lab at the University of Kansas.  I’m extremely grateful to the professor who allowed me to do this.  Not many people would trust a high school student in their lab, much less provide a mentor for one.  I was very lucky.  I smashed a lot of hydrogels, read soooo many hydrogel papers, and had an amazing time.

           

Then I got into MIT.  Home of so many of the amazing biomaterials engineers that I had become familiar with from my initial brushes with the literature and through the NOVA program.  Needless to say I was psyched.

           

When it came time to choose a major, I decided pretty easily.  Course 20 all the way, baby.

Then, when it came time to choose an advisor, I saw Angela Belcher on the list of potentials and thought, hmm, she sounds familiar.  I went and watched her TED talk and was reminded.  “AHH, RIGHT QUEEN OF THE VIRUS BATTERIES. I REMEMBER NOW.  WOW, SHE’S REALLY COOL.”  So, I asked for her as an advisor.  And soon after, I asked for a UROP in Belcher Lab. 

So, yeah, that’s my story of how I already feel like I’ve come full circle from junior year of high school.  And how Angie Belcher, who was one of the people who inspired me as this giant, far away figure in high school, is now my advisor and professor.  I honestly have no idea how or why cool things keep happening to me.  But cool things keep happening to me!  :D

So, needless to say, I was real excited for Mod 3.  And after having worked in the Belcher lab this summer, and having read very, very many of the Belcher lab papers, I felt pretty confident going into Mod 3.  I’d listened to Professor Belcher’s TED talk many times, and I had spent a lot of time over the past year being really excited about phage.  Phage are just so cool.  I love how you can make simple genetic changes to this very well characterized organism and make it do cool things for you.  So, I knew a lot about M13 bacteriophage, and I’d spent the summer agonizing over manipulating piii without destroying infectivity.  (Actually, I’m still kind of agonizing over this, and may spend much of IAP continuing to agonize.  Where to agonize here means, to science.  MUST SCIENCE MOAR.)  I’d read some battery papers, too.  However, I’d never ACTUALLY made one of the batteries.  So, when we started getting into the minutae of actually making a battery and rolling out your material and doing TEM and doing tests for capacity, having never done a battery experiment before, I felt a little like this:   

And that was ok.  Because I had my lab partners and Jifa, battery ninja, was there to help us along.  (Thank you, Jifa!)

Honestly, I really enjoyed the project I was working on in Belcher lab (still do), but I’d always wanted to make a battery out of phage.  Just to have a battery made out of phage and go up to people and be like, “Check out this battery, it’s made out of VIRUSES.  That’s right VIRUSES.  BECAUSE WHY NOT?”  Which I actually did right after we got to bring our batteries home.  I went back to my living group and found all my friends in the lounge and went on a rant about “I CAN BUILD BATTERIES WITH VIRUSES, 20.109 IS THE BESTEST OF ALL LAB CLASSES.”   And now I have one of the batteries I learned about on NOVA four years ago.  That’s really cool.  Guys, this is so cool.  This class is amazing!

 

So, yeah, now I know how to make biotemplated batteries, I’ve finished most of my work for the semester, and I’m headed home soon.  It’s been a long semester, but I now feel a little bit less like that memeified golden retriever who has no idea how to science.  I’ll save some of the long cheesy thank yous for another post, because they will be very long and very cheese, but I would like to once again thank all of the teaching faculty for their amazing work.  You guys make every day in 109 fantastic.  It’s been a rough semester, probably the roughest so far for me at MIT, and I apologize for the times I showed up to lab looking like an exhausted zombie.  You guys kept me motivated and inspired.

And, one final shout out to Angela Belcher, who is even cooler, kinder, more enthusiastic and more amazing in real life than she is standing in front of a green screen periodic table with David Pogue. Thank you, thank you, thank you for inspiring me and for a fantastic Mod 3.