Today was the second day of full-on-dry lab—in other words, we sat around all day, working on our computers, as we attempted to model our enzymes and the possible ways their substrates might bind to them.
The first three weeks of SSP had a massive focus on wet lab. Every day, we were micropipetting, opening vials, centrifuging, calculating concentrations, diluting, and more. So these past few days, for many, have been boring—dry, you might even say.
Especially at first, it was annoying getting used to the intricate software that is MOE (Molecular Operating Environment). But once we got the hang of it, it was pretty cool to be able to visually see a self-created homologous model of our enzyme. We were fast at work by the time lunch came at 12:00 PM.
After lunch, it was back to work with MOE. Now, with our freshly made homology models, we had to run a docking procedure—simply put, we would test which molecules in which poses best fit our enzyme.
Sounds simple enough, but we were there for 4 hours before our procedure was finished!
Finally, we finished at 5:00 PM. After dinner from 6:00 to 7:00 PM, we only had a little bit of time to rest. I took a quick power nap before we went down to the “Hogwarts room” for one last lecture.
That was probably the longest lecture of my life, but it was finally done at 9:30 PM. Still wasn’t the end of the day, though—we spent the next hour finishing up assignment I before we turned in our computers at 10:45 PM.
Then, long story short, I crashed. I really needed my sleep.
But even though SSP has been tiring, it has been nothing short of amazingly fruitful for me. I hope it continues to be so!
-Ahmad
