This path month I have been working on my methodology paper which is what I decided on as my final project. I have been working closely with Maribel, who has graciously given her time to meet with me over zoom. In addition, I have been checking in with Mary Kay. I was able to consolidate a lot of background research I had already previously done into my paper which was nice. I detailed all of the work I did this year documenting the background, methodology, results, discussion, and next steps. I also included images and figures that I had taken/made. This paper is on the "My Project" page of this website!

Additionally, I presented my work yesterday at the 3rd MARC wildcat colloquium. It was a zoom event, but we actually had a pretty large audience full of teachers, students, mentors, family members, and even prospective parents. I was super nervous because it was such a big deal to be presenting everything that I had been working on for the last two years. I also wanted to represent the program and Marin Academy well so I felt a lot of pressure. However, it went very well and I was very proud of myself. It was a huge accomplishment. The slides from the presentation are also on the "My Project" page, I will also link the script that I used.

Since this will be basically my last blog post and the end to my journey in MARC. I would like to take a moment to reflect on everything. I have learned so much these past few years: how to overcoming obstacles, be independent, reading complex journals, reach out to professionals in the field, and communicate my ideas! All of these are life long tools that I will take with me for the rest of my life beyond science and MARC as I move on to the next stage of my education. Next year I will be attending the Cornell School of Hotel Administration and while this may seem far from science, I will take all that I learned through this project/program. Thank you so much to all of my mentors and advisors along the way. Maribel, Dr. Berg, Mary Kay, Shawn, Tania and to Stori for creating this amazing program! You all have supported me tremendously and I really couldn't have accomplished anything without you all. I am so grateful for my time in MARC and will truly miss it all.

Sincerely,

Charlotte

A lot has happened since my last blog post. Since the whole COVID19 crisis we have shifted to a distance learning model and I will no longer be able to work in the lab to finish off this two year project of mine. It is really unfortunate, especially since I feel like I had really started to get a clear vision on what my project would look like as a final product. I also had a clear plan to work with c. elegans and stevia, but now I will no longer be able to continue this work. Through this online learning, I will be posting more regularly on this blog in order to keep track of my progress.

As of right now, I plan on either writing a literature review paper on the effects of stevia and the microbiome or a methodology paper on my stevia and c. elegans study. I anticipate that the first option will be harder to work on just because there are few to no studies on the topic. Right now, I am leaning towards the second option just because I was really excited about my study and I think it would be very cool for someone to replicate it in the future. I have begun looking at Dr. Berg's paper on investigating the C. elegans microbiome and hopefully can gain insight and inspiration from her work and our conversation in the fall.

This past semester I have been working on my preliminary tests where I have been looking at bacteria outside of c. elegans, to gain more insights on the type of bacteria that would be inside c. elegans. This was a formal trial where I added stevia to the bacteria. I used the three types of agar mentioned and then had 2 controls and 2 plates of each stevia concentration (3 total stevia concentrations). Overall, it was hard to see a clear pattern in my results and in how stevia affected the bacteria. In addition, when I added the stevia to the plates, since it wasn’t in the agar it was very liquidy and made my streaking more inaccurate

For my nexts steps, I will be kind of redoing this process using a serial dilution method with a broth culture. A serial dilution is where you have a stock solution and then you dilute it so you have different concentrations. I found this would probably be a more efficient and effective method, since in the study I found they used a broth culture to grow their bacteria. Additionally, the serial dilution will help me avoid overgrowths and also be able to count the colonies more effectively.

This is my presentation that I gave to the MARC class on 2/3/20 outlining my progress on my project this semester.

I started off this semester by checking on my old soil that had been sitting in the research lab over winter break. I decided to still make an extraction on 1/9/20, but I was not sure how much bacteria there would be and how contaminated the soil would be. I made an extraction anyway and plated 2 of each type of agar. In these results, all of the plates had growth except for one MSA plate.

I also started making a new soil and banana decomposition, so that I would be able to make a fresher bacteria extraction. Today, I also planned my preliminary test. I plan on making 8 plates of each TSA, MSA, and EMB. Each type of agar will have 2 controls with no stevia, and then 3 different stevia concentrations (x2 plates each).

I plan to have this test completed by next week. By the end of January, I will present these results in the mid-quarter check in presentations. After that, I will reassess and possibly do more tests depending on how the concentrations of stevia affected the bacteria (I had to make an educated guess on these concentrations). Then, I will begin working using the C. elegans.

Q1 Progress Presentation

This is my presentation that I gave to the MARC class on 10/18/19 outlining my progress on my project this semester

In my science symposium project, I examined the effects of artificial sweeteners including Stevia and Sweet and Low, along with the sugars fructose, glucose, and sucrose. These sugars were tested to see their influence on the bacteria Lactobacillus acidophilus, a significant probiotic found naturally in human intestines. This study, based off of a similar study done at the University of Latvia, tests these five sweeteners using a carbohydrate fermentation test with a phenol red broth. The acid production from fermentation and gas production were both observed after the test was complete. The results demonstrate that the Lactobacillus acidophilus was able to ferment the fructose, glucose, and Sweet and Low and wasn’t able to ferment the sucrose. The stevia was able to be partially fermented by the bacteria. There was no gas production from the bacteria in any of the trials. This experiment is a preliminary test that will lead to further research on the effects of artificial sweeteners, including the lesser researched stevia, on the human microbiome.

Science Symposium Poster