3rd Summary- Translational Medicine: From genes to protein function February 12-14, 2015During the three-day workshop the take home message was that results do not always have to be positive, since

negative results are results and that is what science is all about. This workshop focused on presenting us how

nanoparticle medicine is slowly incrementing, whilst taking into consideration the cell natural behavior. We

began our lab work with a simple DNA extraction from a strawberry, this process consisted of applying a

detergent to separate the cell membrane. Afterwards we used salt in order to join the phosphate group and

ethanol to create a heavier compound which would then precipitate. After performing this simple household

procedure, we went on to discuss what we saw and determined that while a series of buffers aided us in doing

something similar to a ¨PCR¨, the denaturalization, joining and centrifugation of the sample would done the next

day. Genes are the basic components of traits, which are found in chromosomes and are therefore present in all

living organisms. Humans share a 99% of similarity to other humans, yet in the workshop we discussed how

alleles make these microscopic differences macroscopic at a longer rate. Alleles give certai physical traits, which

could be mutated with the environment, nevertheless they are found in DNA. On Friday we began with an

arsenal of facts about genetics, for example; the length of a DNA strand is about the size of Shaquille O'Neal

(two meters) , and we contain over four million nucleotides. Studies in gene therapy directed to making changes

to DNA are currently taking place, and Cell- Based Delivery has proven effective due to a direct message change

within the same cell. STEM are basically uncoded cells which can modify themselves to help us with inner body

changed. These cells have a direct delivery mechanism in which when a virus influences the cell DNA code then

it intrinsically modifies itself to attack the virus. HIV was discussed and as an example and we understood how

it reverses transcription & translation processes. On friday we worked with protein analysis, in order to do this

we used the western blotting technique which had a couple of differences from the the classic electrophoresis.

The initial difference is that this was a polyacrylamide gel and it was vertically placed so we could observed the

gene movement toward the positive pole due to negative phosphate group. We were given three different

patients and tested how an F9 gene which influences hemophilia when mutated. Although the workshop on

Friday was useful, I arrived home thinking about what could have possibly gone wrong. The initial

electrophoresis results did not come out as planned, first of all because the regular electrophoresis gel did not

contain ethidium bromide, whilst on the other hand the polyacrylamide gel did present variations regarding the

presence of the F9 gene on different patients. We confirmed our classroom acquired knowledge with the central

dogma of biology where DNA goes to RNA and then to Protein. Understanding the basic rules was good, but

being able to comprehend what was going on genetically speaking was priceless, these techniques are and will

be pivotal towards my development as a researcher.