Week 2: Catalina Island : Sanchit Kumar
During this week my lab sent me to Catalina Island where USC has their very own satellite campus in which they do most of their marine research. My job was to spend a whole week at the island learning the different side projects that Dr. Capone and his graduate student Yubin where doing, and to collect samples of macro algae that were to be used in these experiments. We would spend the days at the water front diving for samples, and also looking at the marine life that surrounded the island.
Here is a video of what we did most of the time.
For the most part not much research has been done on decomposing matter and its role in nitrogen fixation, but Dr. Capone's lab has been changing that. When macro algae decomposes the enzyme nitrogenase is very active and is more likely to be fixing N2 nitrogen.
What my lab does is take different species of macro algae and keep them in tanks to wait for the decomposition period. When that happens they take little samples and inject acetylene into the bottles because nitrogenase cannot tell the difference between N2 and acetylene.
If the nitrogenase is at work the acetylene will be converted into ethylene, which we test using a machine called a gas chromatography or "GC"
Other than that the Island was beautiful and what time we weren't working we spent playing beach volleyball and eating that catches that the spear fisherman brought back to the island.
Here is a video of what we did most of the time.
For the most part not much research has been done on decomposing matter and its role in nitrogen fixation, but Dr. Capone's lab has been changing that. When macro algae decomposes the enzyme nitrogenase is very active and is more likely to be fixing N2 nitrogen.
What my lab does is take different species of macro algae and keep them in tanks to wait for the decomposition period. When that happens they take little samples and inject acetylene into the bottles because nitrogenase cannot tell the difference between N2 and acetylene.
If the nitrogenase is at work the acetylene will be converted into ethylene, which we test using a machine called a gas chromatography or "GC"
Other than that the Island was beautiful and what time we weren't working we spent playing beach volleyball and eating that catches that the spear fisherman brought back to the island.
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