BY SABRINA EDWARDS ’18

Q: Where did you do research this summer?

A: I was in Houston this summer doing research at MD Anderson Cancer Center, which is affiliated with the University of Texas. 

Q: What specifically were you researching?

A: So MD Anderson is obviously focused on cancer and eliminating cancer, so I was working on more of the chemical synthesis lab and chemical biology side of that area. I actually had two projects because we were initially assigned mentors and we didn’t really have a choice over who we were being assigned to.

BY SABRINA EDWARDS ’18

Q: Where did you do research this summer?

A: I was here at Mount Holyoke in Professor McMenimen’s lab.

Q: What was your project?

A: I was assigned a new project with my lab partner during the spring semester, but my lab partner had another internship so she wasn’t here for the summer, so I was alone in the lab. I created a TAG point mutation in the n-terminus region using PCR of a small heat shock protein, specifically HSP27. Traditionally, the translational machinery would stop translation at the stop codon, and produce a truncated version of the protein. In my research, I transformed an orthogonal translational machinery and with the addition of unnatural amino acids (UAA), we are hoping to see the machinery charge the UAA at the stop codon, and continue translating to produce a full length protein.