During this past summer I had the opportunity to participate of the Amgen Scholars Program hosted by the University of California in Berkeley. I worked for 10 weeks on a research project with Dr. John D. Coates from the Department of Plant & Microbial Biology. His lab is focused on Applied Environmental Microbiology and most of his research is focused to understanding anaerobic microbes and their metabolisms in order to provide an understanding to develop biotechnological applications such as harvesting energy and bioremediation of contaminated soils and waters. My particular project intended to develop a novel rapid screening method to study a library of mutants. The main goal was to understand the underlying genetic mechanisms of iron biooxidation in Diaphorobacter sp. strain TPSY. This project required a lot of hard work, dedication and patience, since method development for any research project is the hardest and most tedious part.
Berkeley is a great place to do science. Throughout the years, Berkeley has been recognized as one of the places where most scientific discoveries occur. UC Berkeley provides students a great and solid training, helping the student develop its ability to think critically as a scientist and as a human being. It is very diverse and promotes a free spirit feeling. Berkeley and UC Berkeley motivate their citizens and students to be actively involved on environmentally related issues, on politics and all socially related issues. Scientists do science but are as well concerned of everything that it is happening on the society that surrounds them and they as well contribute to the community’s collective survival.
I had a great learning experience in Berkeley. It helped me develop my abilities as a scientist to think independently and critically. It also led me the opportunity to collaborate with top notch scientists and researchers. I can definitively see myself studying in Berkeley for grad school. In fact, the professor I collaborated with wants me to join his lab by next fall for graduate school because he was very pleased by my passion and dedication on my project.
And for those who are still wondering about the outcomes of my project, we succeeded on the development of the assay and we have already identified some mutants that will be further rescreen. Once and iron biooxidadizing mutant is identified, the genetic mechanisms involved will be known. This project was only the first step on understanding the unknown mechanism of anaerobic nitrate dependent iron biooxidation.
