Grad Diary 4/5/10

Wow...I feel like my head's about to explode.

My project came to an end a little over a week ago when my ligation reactions, once again, failed to produce viable colonies for me to expand. I wrapped things up in my notebook, noted things to do differently, and who knows, I might come back to it down the road.

Now that I'm an official member of the lab, I wanted to really dive into my ideas for thesis projects. I am especially interested in integration, which is necessary (but insufficient) for cancer progression. I am especially interested in the mechanisms underlying integration, which is not known. However, Jian's lab doesn't specialize or focus on these questions directly, so I wanted to take some time to read up on the relevant literature, define my questions and develop experimental approaches. Basically, come up with a thesis project.

So I've been reading non-stop for two weeks now, and sometimes I feel like my head is going to burst. It's kind of interesting to see how, over the course of a week, I have gotten to the point where I can pretty much breeze through the introduction (been there, done that) and go straight to the results and discussion. Sometimes I also spend a lot of time in the materials and methods section. It's been simultaneously super exciting and super boring. I am not doing any real lab work, which is boring, but I am learning a lot, making connections, developing ideas, and asking questions, which is very exciting.

I spent almost an hour and a half with Jian today talking about some of the papers I've been reading and refocusing my inquiries. We also started talking about experimental approaches which was useful but a little premature. I am hoping that after another week or so of reading I will be able to really home in on the questions I want to ask and then start coming up with ways of addressing them.

Additionally, I am giving lab meeting this week, which will be a summary of my rotation experience and a small taste of what's to come. This will probably mean I will get a little less reading done this week, but that's okay. I'm not exactly pressed for time or anything yet.

So far it's been a really great experience going through the literature, but I have quickly found that the paper trail never ends...almost every paper references another paper that I think is worth reading, which then references another paper. Sometimes you can pick out a few key papers in the field which are commonly referenced but I could literally spend a year reading up on everything HPV related and never get through it all. It's been hard trying to establish limits but I am getting better at it.

I will hopefully have more interesting things to share in the coming week(s) so stay tuned!