Genetics
Project 2: Murder Mystery
In this project, we first learned about the backgrounds of the setting of this murder. We were given a sheet of paper with the description of the night of the crime, as well as backgrounds on all of the suspects and the victim. Then, we conducted several experiments to simulate real forensic science in order to zero in on a suspect to be convicted of the crime. Some things that we did includes fingerprinting and blood typing, included in the write-up and the images below.
Crime Scene Evidence Images
Project 3: pKiwi Lab
In this lab, we were to put to use our knowledge of genetic engineering by putting E. coli colonies through bacterial transformation to cause them to glow green. This is caused by inserted the gene pKiwi, which includes GFP, which stands for Green Fluorescent Protein, and ampR, (Beta-lactamase), the former a protein from jellyfish that caused the bacteria to fluoresce, the latter being a trait for resistance to ampicillin, because the ampcillin is like an activator for the glow of the plasmid. In order for the DNA to adhere, however, the bacterias' cell walls have to be permeable in order for the DNA to be let in. This is the the first step, heat and cold shock. The E. coli is first put into CaCl2, which helps to permeabalize the cell walls. Then, the pKiwi plasmid is added into the vial with the bacteria, which is then dipped into a heat bath and then immediately into a cold bath. Then, after incubating, it is plated onto agar gel, and then LB Broth is added, which encourages bacterial growth. After waiting for a couple of days, the bacteria will have grown into large colonies if the procedure has been followed correctly, including sterile practices to stop contamination that may interfere wit the growth of the bacteria. Then, in order, to see the plasmid's adherance, the bacterial plates are put under a UV light, which illuminates the fluorescence, in which only one plate should have the glow. This is because there are four plates in total, all have LB, but only two have the added pKiwi plasmid, and only two have the ampicillin, as labeled in the image below. Then, after doing the entire process, we analyzed the results and wrote about it (lab write-up). In this particular experiment, there was contamination in all plates, but there was still a lot of bacterial growth. This is because the procedure was not extremely sterile and careful with the cleaning, but fortunately it did not cause any issues with the process and the actual results. Below, the are the results of my group's lab, and the plate in the upper right corner, is the one with the glowing bacteria, if you look closely. The large patches that appear to be mold are the contaminants, and the spread of the bacteria are the colonies. If the experiment is done correctly, three plates should have growth (all except the lower right), one will not (lower right plate), and one of the plates with growth will glow (upper right). So our experiment was successful, because all of these predictions match our results.
