Skip to main content

Alumnus Presents his Prize Winning DNA Barcoding Project


This week, alum Eric C. ’12, a sophomore at Trinity School, visited our fifth grade boys to speak about his participation in the Urban Barcode Project, an annual science competition for NYC high school students, run by the DNALC at Cold Spring Harbor.

Eric and his partner, the youngest team, won second prize in the competition, an amazing achievement.  The top 100 teams are invited to compete after submitting a comprehensive proposal to the Competition Committee.

Eric explained to the fifth grade that he and his partner studied Bird’s Nest soup, an Asian delicacy. The soup, which is believed to have medicinal value, comes from Swiftlets, birds found in deep, dark caves in China that create their nests from woven and dried saliva.

Extracting the nests from the caves is an expensive, risky endeavor, and the soup is quite costly. “Since the soup is so expensive, we wanted to know if the big brands selling it used real Bird’s Nest or if they were frauds,” explained Eric. He and his partner had hypothesized that they would find that the soup was fraudulent.

Eric and his partner discovered that extracting the DNA from the Bird’s Nest was particularly difficult because of the possibility of decay and degeneration over time.  Upon extracting DNA from samples, and performing their barcode analysis, they were surprised to discover that the samples did indeed contain aerodramus fuciphagus, the DNA from the Edible Cave Nest Swiflet. 

The fifth grade boys were riveted by Eric’s discussion of the scientific method; i.e. take an unanswered question, generate a hypothesis, and then test it rigorously. An extensive colloquy followed.

Our fifth grade boys have been involved in an expansive study of DNA through our partnership with Cold Spring's DNALC since January. They have sampled and performed DNA barcoding on certain fruits and vegetables.  The process involves the boys first isolating the DNA from the sample, then amplifying the DNA by replicating a specific gene sequence, and thirdly, the step of electrophoresis, where the boys verify the success of the PCR (Polymerase Chain Reaction); finally, the boys send the DNA to a facility in New Jersey that decodes the DNA sequence and returns the results to the boys.

Shortly, as the culmination of this unit of study, each boy will gather samples and perform DNA barcoding using the aforementioned process on a substance of his choice. This will be the most exciting portion of their study and their chance to contribute to the wider scientific body of knowledge. Species or samples that have not yet been cataloged, will be authored by them.

You can view reflections from participants in the Urban Barcode Project, including Eric, at this link: Urban Barcode Project. 



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

OLIVER!

This morning our fifth graders continued a great year-end tradition at Saint David's, The Fifth Grade Musical. The boys performed Oliver! and they were fantastic, providing impressive performances and demonstrating great vocal ability. They have been mastering the dialogue and musical numbers for weeks, and clearly gave it their all. Congratulations to the cast on a job well done, and to their Producers/Teachers James Hubbard and Jamie MacNeille, Director Phyllis Clark, Musical Conductor Jeff Moore, and the Parent Committee of Cynthia Chapman, Susan Kissane, Tara Neumann, Joyce Restituto, and Ann Roberts. Musical theater is alive and well at Saint David's!
Post a Comment
Read more

Fascinating Art Talk by Michelle Marder Kamhi at Grandparents Event

Yesterday evening, independent scholar and critic Michelle Marder Kamhi ( www.mmkamhi.com ), co-editor with husband Louis Torres of Aristos , an online review of arts; author of Who Says That's Art? A Commonsense View of the Visual Arts ; and grandmother of two Saint David's boys, gave a thought provoking talk on art for our grandparent community. An advocate of objective standards in arts scholarship and criticism, Ms. Kamhi focused her talk on the ways in which art critics such as Clement Greenberg promoted the shift from representational art to abstraction. Kamhi argues that the abstract and post-modern art prevalent today, which often requires explanation by docents in order to be understood, goes against art's purpose. Taking issue with Greenberg's contention that representation is an expendable convention of painting, she quoted the late art critic John Canaday: "Art is the tangible expression of the intangible values that men live by." ...
Post a Comment
Read more

NE Patriot Tom Brady at Saint David’s

Last night, Saint David’s was honored to have one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time, four time Superbowl champion and three-time MVP winner Tom Brady, as the guest speaker for our Alumni Parents Council Lecture Series. Tom, who is the father of one of our Saint David's boys, addressed a standing-room-only audience in Hyman Hall comprised of our eighth graders, alumni, alumni parents and faculty. Friendly, introspective, witty, and wise, he directed his talk to the delighted eighth graders in the front of the room, and focused on the topic of leadership. “You are the young men and leaders of Saint David’s,” he noted. Tom debunked the perception that leaders are born not made, and credited his leadership abilities to “standing up to and facing fears” and to “cultivating a mental strength,” which he cited as “more important than being physically strong.” He also stressed the importance of working hard, honoring teamwork, believing in oneself and being a good lis...
Post a Comment
Read more