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WYFP - One Fish, Two Fish, Zebrafish, Zebrafish. [1]

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Date: 2023-02-25  

Finally, I got to play with the fishes do some research in the lab last Friday afternoon for several hours with a couple of other students and Dr. C. She’s the one who organizes the lab and keeps things going, and it’s her research we worked on today. She’s also my most reliable source for information on grad school, a really good teacher, and said she would write me a letter for my grad school application, so it was a very productive day, and fun too.

We use zebrafish. They share 80% of our genes, and are pretty good models to work with for a lot of reasons — similar systems and such, we’re very similar in a lot of ways.

Zebrafish at a party, hanging around and drinking like fishes

The research we are doing right now is about memory retention, stress and diet, and I won’t explain how it all works farther than that really. I have some research I want to work on as well in the future, assuming I get into grad school and can continue working at the lab. It wasn’t really difficult work, just moving a couple of fish around and filming them swimming for 10 minutes at a time in two different containers. Then they go into the used tank, to be left to school and rest with other fish that have been experimented on.

Austin was at the lab too — I’ll be helping him with his research once we get the autistic fish and the necessary tanks built. (I know, right? autistic fish) You can buy them from University of Oregon and places like that where they are bred for scientific use. You can get a wide variety of fish with different characteristics, though I have no idea how they do it. The trick is paying the $10 a fish cost as poor students and a small department — but they’ve written a grant proposal to get the cost covered for the 60-80 fish we will need for the whole experiment. We’re presenting a poster there about the research we want to do, and some other people from our lab are presenting as well.

On the grad school front I got a lot of information today, and I need to learn how to write a CV for grad school and figure out how to fill it out and make myself not sound boring. I need 3 letters of recommendation, I think a personal statement and a fuck ton of money. But I’m looking forward to it really I think now, more than I was before. Next meeting of the lab will be all about grad school as well, so that will be helpful. I have 2 professors I can ask for letters that have already offered them, but not a third. I was actually thinking of my rabbi maybe writing one, since we worked together for over a year on my conversion. We’ll see.

Previous in the week had been total shit. Lots of rain, cold and general ughness. I have had a nice Friday, and Shabbat is always good, and I have a five day weekend from school. I do have a test on that Thursday when we go back though, but I have plenty of time to study. I also bought myself some tulips today for Shabbat — they’re my favorite flower.

I hope you all had a fine Saturday, and I’ll be here later on to hang out.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/2/25/2153599/-WYFP-One-Fish-Two-Fish-Zebrafish-Zebrafish

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