Meet our UiO:Life Science summer intern Elizabeth Surgucheva
This spring I finished my bachelor’s degree in biosciences at the University of Oslo. UiO:Life Science funds educational summer research projects for students with the aim of giving students hands-on experience with research. I was lucky to be assigned to the project offered by the Department of Biomaterials for six weeks.
What has Elizabeth learned during her summer project?
During my six weeks in the Biomaterials lab, I was working on a research project that aims to investigate how cells respond to a hydrogel loaded with chemoattractant molecules originating from platelet lysate. This project had two separate aims: on the one hand, we wanted to investigate how cells migrate towards hydrogel in a 2D assay and on the other, how cells invade the hydrogel material in 3D when cultured within the hydrogel itself. My main task in these projects was to find the minimum concentration of platelet lysate necessary to stimulate migration of human stem cells towards and within platelet lysate loaded hydrogels. With this project, I have learned how to quantify the amount of proteins in biological samples using BCA and multiplex assays, how to use time-lapse confocal microscopy to visualise cell migration and gotten great experience in the cell lab.
The group at the Department for Biomaterials has a welcoming environment with great conversations and many helping hands. Being an interdisciplinary workplace, it creates room for inspiring curiosity within science. The group consists of people from all over the world, which leads to many interesting and cultural conversations. Thanks to this, not only did I learn how to work in the lab but also gained a good amount of new knowledge about other countries.
I am thankful for all the guidance I received from my two supervisors Daria and Hanna. There was always room for questions, and whenever problems arose, they were efficiently solved.
