Month: May 2014

In the last two years I have been trained at the Medical University of Vienna in the field of Proteomics. This technique allows me and my research group to study the protein set expressed by an organism or system. In simple words, it is like taking a snapshot of the proteins expressed at that given time, retrieving information about their abundances, the way they might interact, the changes or post-translational modifications they underwent. As you might imagine, this picture can very much differ if it is shot at particular time, in regards to a particular cytotype or in response to certain stimuli. All this
together with the size and complexity of the human proteome makes proteomics a very challenging research approach.

But what I also learned in this past two years is the importance of working in a team. By sharing competencies, skills and ideas, teamwork has increased the efficiency of my project progresses and improved the quality of it. Good communication, frequent meetings, feedbacks have had a benefit not only on my research project but also increased motivation, enthusiasm and reduced work-related stress. Going to work every day in such a positive environment has been so far for me a great source of commitment and I hope, the key for successful PhD project.

Silvia Tarantino

Everyone who works in a laboratory knows very well the meaning of the word repetition. Here I would like to tell (or rather write) you something about the inevitable, sometimes maybe frustrating: the repetition of experiments.

I work on peritoneal fibroblasts which I isolate (method already described by Andras in his previous blog of April 30th) and separate into two
subpopulations. In my daily lab work I use various measurement methods to find the differences between obtained subsets. Some differences are visible right after separation procedure such as cell morphology, however more interesting is what is inside of these cells. To determine what is invisible I perform: enzymatic immunoassay to measure concentration of cytokines, western blots and immunofluorescence staining to examine selected proteins production and rtPCR to analyze selected gene expression.

The parameter measured once, in single assay, gives an impression that something really interesting may come out from our experiments. Here we got to the point of repetition. To achieve the amount of results that is significant for our research, thus to change an impression into a fact (scientific fact) the repetition of measurements has to be done multiple times. Therefore I isolate cells again, separate them (again) and make another assay to confirm results. And this is what we all do in our labs: repeating, repeating and repeating.

Edyta Kawka