Profile

My Typical Day:

One thing I like about being a scientist is that every day is different. If it is a day when I am staining tissue, I am usually very excited to see how it turns out. This is one of my favourite types of experiments but there are lots of steps to take before you get to the stage where you stain the tissue. First a very small piece of tissue is kept in a block of wax. It is cut very thinly and placed on a glass slide. It needs to be treated very carefully while you put the slide through all the different steps. This involves making up different chemicals, putting the slide in and out of the oven, then into lots of different liquids and washing it carefully. My favourite part is when i put a special chemical called a chromogen onto the slide. I place the slide on the microscope and I see it begin to change colour before my eyes! Depending on my experiment, it will colour different things. It can show me how all the neurons are arranged so that they send messages exactly where they need to go. It can show me how star-shaped cells puff up when they sense danger. It can show me when immune cells are invading and where they are getting through. Staining can show you so much, it just depends on how you plan your experiment. That is why it is worth all the time it takes to get to my favourite part.