Progress is (finally) being made

Some of my grad. student peers would be able to tell you that I was fairly frustrated by my lack of progress on my project last semester. It was a LOT of waiting for things to get done that were out of my control. However, all that is changing, and it feels so good to be busy in the lab again! Tackling new protocols is a little bit stressful, but also really invigorating in a weird way. In any case, the few hours I was in the lab flew by. 

This is the thermocycler I used to do my reverse transcriptase reaction. I extracted RNA (single stranded nucleic acid) from two viruses and some cells, and after this reaction I have complementary DNA. This is only the second step out of 8 before I have my first set of results...but I'm hoping to have it all done by the end of next week! Our colleague from NY who designed my array will be in Ames next week, so I am looking forward to talking with him in person to answer the questions I still have.