PCRs are back again!

Was pretty depressed the past weeks cuz after a few months' hiatus from PCR-ing, they suddenly did not work! :( But yesterday, i got like at least 50% of them working well again! Since this is a duplex reaction i am trying, sometimes one reaction just doesn't work as well. But those that work, are looking good! Check out the gorgeous gel in the last panel at the bottom!! :D If only all gels looked like that, or better! Haha greedy pig. But whew, these 96 PCRs took more than 1.5h to set up, and another 1.5h to run the gel for!!
Doesn't seem like there is any genetic variation though.. :s

Not cut out for this.

There has been a recent flurry of publications from friends and colleagues all around me! Of course, I'm proud of them for their achievements, and honoured to know them. But it's really starting to make me feel inadequate, especially when even my experiments are not going smoothly :( Been at my microsat work for ages yet I am still troubleshooting, and unsure of my sampling method :( :( Yet it seems people all around are publishing on these damn microsats. It's prolly just me :(

And then I find this paper from 2007 on larval rearing which documents their changes in vertical distribution!! Same idea as my other set of experiments but seems to be conducted in a much more realistic manner. Oh gosh I am so screwed. 2007!! Why didn't I come across this paper in my literature search? How is any of my work of relevance, or going to be publishable...? :'(

I feel so useless. :(

Willi Hennig Conference

After a long absence from blogging, I'm finally back. Prolly cuz someone reminded me that I have a blog! I'd been neglecting it for the evil Facebook. But then it occurred to me, it's prolly more cuz nobody actually reads this blog, so I'm talking to the wall when i write here. Haha. Ok i shall save my most private inner thoughts for this then, just like the good old pen-book-diary days (not that I could ever keep one for long!).

Anyway, the past few months have somehow gone past in a blur.. With the coral spawning mania over, there was the World Ocean Conference in Manado, followed by a period of depression... and then just last week, the Willi Hennig Conference which I'm supposed to be blogging about!

So although I was kinda made to attend this conference as a participant (first time attending a conference without having to prepare anything!), it was a pretty good experience I must say :) The even kicked off (for me) with a talk on Charles Darwin by Alfred Wallace by a historian, Dr John van Wyhe from Cambridge University. To think I was contemplating not attending the talk! Good thing I did in the end, 'cuz I really enjoyed the talk, and was even thinking about looking up Darwin's Beagle voyage books in the library! Never thought I'd actually enjoy such a nerdy talk ="=

The following few days of talks was really trying though.. So many trees.. Everyone was generating phylogenetic trees and presenting some funky analysis which I tried so hard to understand! (Danwei, this woulda been the perfect conference for you!!) Big words like synapomorphy, apomorphy etc that I'd seen before but can't remember what they meant, really threw me off balance.. I prolly understood < 5% of each talk :( Trying to be intelligent when you're not is tough! But I don't regret attending the talks, as I really wanna widen my horizon, and I think I did learn some stuff (albeit prolly not worth USD$150)! :p It was quite different from the other conferences I'd attended, as this conference was on a much smaller scale so it was a bit more engaging during the Q&A session, and there was no frantically running around between sessions!

One of my favourites about conferences is meeting people. Not just about seeing all the quirky characters of the scientists, like we had a Santa Claus, a Jesus Christ etc., but more so about being awed by the brilliance of these people. How I wish I could be just half as intelligent as any of them! Two of the people who left the deepest impression were "Jesus", the developer of TNT (better than PAUP!) and Dr John van Wyhe, the expert on Charles Darwin. It was really good meeting John, cuz I'd been really perturbed about religion/creationism & evolution for the longest time, and he did enlighten me somewhat. Although I still think I won't be able to accept believing in both at the same time, I can better understand why so many of my friends can. Thanks John! :) Hehe and now I think I have a mild crush on John, a HISTORIAN! ="= A true nerd indeed. How unthinkable!! :p Haha, think I'm just attracted to intelligent men :p :p Hehe so I shamelessly introduced myself, and even asked to have a picture taken with him!

On the Path to Permanent Head Damage

After weeks of panic and frantic preparation, I've finally officially cleared the qualifying examinations that allow me to proceed on the path of permanent head damage. Looking back, I can't believe the frustration I went through the 2 weeks just before the doomed presentation. It's just another public presentation, wasn't it? And to be honest, I think I was prolly more upset with myself and perhaps my boss more than I was worried about the presentation itself. Somewhere inside, I think it's got to do with the many many presentations I have had to give thus far. Guiding at Kusu, teaching the undergraduates, international conferences even, and as much as I hate to admit, I think the frequent presentations for this module I took this semester kinda made me numb to presenting - I have learnt to be thick-skinned!! ="=

Here are some photos that one of my colleagues took of me during the presentation:

That was me desperately trying to undo the format changes that the seminar room's computer had done to my ppt slides (Check out the ppt slide! I designed it myself, cuz I had no idea what picture to put)

Prof Tan, the Chair of my seminar, and also one of the examiners, introducing me to the audience

Me "ready" to field questions from the floor

The presentation went OK, though I got a question on Googgle Earth which I made no sense of, and one question from Richard Corlett that I wished I'd answered much better. It was a question I'd asked myself before over and over again, but I still did not have an answer to it. Then came the grilling session with my examiners, where everyone else was chased out. I got a mild shock, as I did not expect even my supervisors had to go! But thankfully, the examiners were really nice to me *muacks*. As Siva said, they were more trying to help than ruin me. And I really appreciated their concerns about the many risks of my project, my workload - all of which debunked the expectations my own supervisor imposed on me! Gosh you don't know how relieved I was to finally get this kinda affirmation. For my morale has been so badly battered by my supervisor's high expectations and demands. Thank you, Sirs. :)

During the past 2 dark weeks, I also experienced so much love and support from some wonderful people. Words alone can't express my gratitude to them. Karenne, for the immense support and tonnes of advice, lending me a listening ear when I needed to pour my heart out. Thank you so much, you have been so sweet =) Pamela, who was my nanny and forced me to write my proposal, something which I'd otherwise have too much inertia to really get down to doing. And to my "new friends" from the Evo Lab, who have been just the sweetest, supportive (& wacky) bunch of labmates. I love you guys already. This Christmas, I am going to be more broke, but more wealthy in other ways =)