Baserga Lab News

Franziska makes good snack better!

2009-09-11T14:18:00.003-04:00

The Baserga lab snack drawer is usually stocked with pretzels, chocolate, and other savory delights. However, until recently we had been unsatisfied with our choice of healthy carbohydrate options. We'd tried Triscuits, Ritz crackers, Goldfish, and numerous other "multi-grain snack cracker" type foods. However, none seemed to fit the bill. As the holder of the greatest prowess in genetic manipulation, Franziska set out to design a "Super Cracker." Really, what we wanted was a snack that "walked" so readily into our mouths, we wouldn't have to waste any extra time between experiments. After unveiling the structure Franziska used to solve our snacking dilemma, it was quickly snapped up for publication. The Yale publicity office immediately came over to interview Susan.

“It looks like a wheat thin with feet,” Susan said. “When you can discern structure, you can often figure out function.” And in this case, the function is making our tummies happy.

Check out the Yale Office of Public Affairs' story on the story here.

Erica's papers come out

2009-07-23T09:23:00.005-04:00

After a few months of arm-wrestling the reviewers, both of Erica's papers generated from her thesis work were published. In addition to the arm-wrestling, she completed other feats of strength needed to demonstrate intellectual superiority (including lab chores like autoclaving hundreds of liters of media, bench-pressing cases of latex gloves, and "walking over hot coals", simulated by broken lab glassware that had P-32 drizzled over it).

You can catch your own glimpse of the papers here and here.

New lab mascot!

2009-07-21T13:59:00.004-04:00

Last month the Baserga lab got a new mascot. Phoebe came in for a few hours to say hello to everyone, and got pretty tired out playing with all her new best friends. Luckily, we have Sam's lap to serve as a suitable napping surface. No floor for this spoiled pup. Welcome to the Basergas, Phoebe!

A late Champion update

2009-02-09T10:30:00.003-05:00

Erica A. Champion successfully defended her thesis Friday July 18th, 2008. Attended by an audience of near 100 persons, Erica showcased her Utp6 protein with a tip of her half-a-tetratricopeptide repeat (HAT). After stunning her committee with her results and impeccable presentation skills, Erica, her parents, the lab, and her friends enjoyed some potent potables with noted notables, including her former advisers Chandler Fulton and Elaine Lai, pictured below.

We're all proud of you, Erica!

(and we hope you'll come back often to help us with the crosswords and oreo consumption)

Freezin' for a Reason

2009-02-09T10:14:00.003-05:00

David Dunbar, alumnus of the Baserga lab, has taken the plunge! David chose to help raise money for Eastern Pennsylvania Special Olympics by wearing nothing but his bathing suit in the frigid Delaware River. Read more about what this Cabrini College professor did here.

Bennett sees the forest through the trees

2008-07-16T12:10:00.004-04:00

This summer, the Baserga lab mourns the loss of their undergraduate, Bennett.

"But now who will trouble shoot my protein purifications!" Emily cried.

The department of MB&B was immensely pleased with his progress while here, especially his work on saving the rainforest, one bonsai tree at a time. For this, he was awarded the prestigious Paul Siegler Memorial Prize, and given a token to wear during the commencement ceremonies (see pictures below).

Bennett now continues on to a more illustrious career in Boston, evaluating the economic and environmental impact of picking up peanut shells from the Green Monster after Red Sox games and feeding them to free-range swine.

Christmas in July

2008-07-16T11:57:00.003-04:00

Emptying out old pictures from the lab camera, Emily and Kat hit the jackpot.

What do the Basergas do on a snow day in lab? Well, Franziska works harder because the roads aren't safe to drive home on, Erica bugs Bennett for more slave labor - I mean data, Laura works with radioactivity, Neal doesn't come in because he's shoveling his driveway, Mike tends to his family, and the youngest members? Well, they just play. Outside. Because Kat didn't have a snowy childhood in Florida.

Below are pictures of the snow person Kat, Kara, and Emily created, as well as the snow yeast, made especially for the Baserga lab, by the Baserga lab.

Definition of a biochemist

2008-02-25T11:51:00.001-05:00

(lifted from The Daily Transcript, Taxonomy of the Sciences)

Biochemist: Basically biochemists play with proteins. Usually this involves fancy machines that cost a ton of money. Proteins are subjected to centrifugation, electrophoresis, fast protein liquid chromatography, gel exclusion chromatography .... Incidentally these techniques are just sophisticated ways of pushing and shoving proteins around. If enough proteins clump together, biochemists get excited and call the clump a complex. If the complex is really big, the biochemist will call it the somethingosome. If you ask a biochemist to show you pretty data, he/she'll show you his/her bands. Biochemists kill cells for their precious bodily fluids.(author: The Daily Transcript)

Ribosome slogans

2008-02-13T16:22:00.001-05:00

Because So Much Is Riding On Your Ribosomes.

Generated by the Advertising Slogan Generator, for all your slogan needs. Get more ribosomes slogans.

Laura "Kamikaze" Dutca spikes again!

2007-11-30T11:44:00.000-05:00

In an effort to increase fitness in the lab, Neal, Kat and Laura have joined a rec league indoor volleyball team. Little did we know that Laura would be stealing the show from the rest of the team. Diving, spiking, and serving to beat the band (yes, there's a pep band she hired just to cheer her on), each game Laura displays super-human athletic abilities. And now we know we definitely have grounds to push for a C-wing summer sports league.

Go Team Baserga!

(and not just on weboggle)

Neal's photo shoot

2007-11-20T15:51:00.000-05:00

Since having his offer accepted to buy a house, Neal's been feeling like a movie star. Although he hasn't even closed on the property yet, he's been giving autographs and posing for pictures in front of anything that even remotely resembles a home. Small cottages, condos, cardboard boxes that get delivered to the lab...

Recently we caught him in a nicer looking sweater than usual, and decided to try our luck.

At first, he was ok with the photo shoot.

By the second take, he got a little bored.

Then he got really... um... strange.
(Ask Emily - she's looking on worriedly from the background)

We decided that we'd rather not have that many pictures of Neal, and that we should instead send him on vacation. But not until he made us more plates.

Erica re-learns Northern Blots

2007-11-20T12:59:00.000-05:00

After completing nearly 6 years of graduate work, Erica has decided she should start running Northern blots. ("Again!", she adds.) While her project has been mainly concerned with protein-protein interactions, her committee members decreed that since she works in an RNA lab ("Technically!", Erica interjects), there should be more Northern blots in her thesis.

Unfortunately, as it's been more than 4 years since she ran her last Northern, Erica found she had a little trouble pouring such a large gel.

"You mean I have to pour it into the gel tray? Not right into the buffer circulation tank?"

Better luck next time, Miss Champion.
Don't worry, you still don't have to give RNA seminar.

Mike wins a poster prize!

2007-10-31T12:27:00.000-04:00

Recently at the MB&B departmental retreat, J. Michael Charette represented the Baserga laboratory and took home second place in the post-doc poster contest! Instead of taking a life size representation of himself as Kat suggested, he decided instead to make a graphically stunning presentation of the massive amounts of work he did in August - a record 4500 western blots! These blots were represented in small figures 1 cm x 1cm in various color shades to form a magic eye image of a euglena - an organism that Mike's had a soft spot for (and I don't mean chloroplast) since his lowly graduate school days.

Congratulations Mike!

Funny things that happened today:

2007-09-26T13:44:00.000-04:00

Kat called Kara "trash".
Emily got asked out by the burrito cart guy (who wears hot pants). And he said goodbye by kissing her on the cheek.

Rememberance of days past

2007-09-25T09:52:00.000-04:00

Our more avid readers may have noticed a change in the decor at the Baserga Lab. (If not, scroll up to the pretty chromatin spread. Isn't it pretty? It took about 5 hours to make; it had better be pretty!) Besides the website decor, many more changes have been made:

We have four new lab members! Their pictures can be found here. Perhaps we'll also introduce them in forthcoming blog entries.

Our blog (news) and publications are now hosted by Blogspot. This is because Yale Med now allows web publishing only from Yale Med IPs. It's dumb, I know.

You can no longer comment on our posts. Sorry. It was too much of a hassle to code, and we weren't getting many comments anyway. If you have something to say, you know our emails.

We're planning to update the lab tour. Don't rush us.

But oh, how times have changed! Remember our first look?

The very talented Jonathan Bernstein made that site. That was back when we looked like this:

Then we changed to that minty green:

And we took group photos at the RNA meeting:

And when Madhu left everyone was sad:

Ah, the good old days. We can only hope the future will hold even better times.

For further nostalgia, read the news archives! (Links are up there in the right-side menu.)

The Push-Up Game

2007-09-14T12:54:00.000-04:00

We invite our readers to try the newly invented sport (but soon-to-be party game sensation): The Push-Up Game. (Note: It has nothing to do with bras. . . . Except that it helps to wear one while participating.)

The Play:
Competitors stand at a fixed distance from the wall (or lab bench, file cabinet, lab tech, whatever you have lying around that will stay put). Players let themselves fall toward the wall, and catch themselves before they hit the wall. You can decide whether they can use both arms or only one arm to catch themselves. A player is disqualified if any part of her face touches the wall-- no broken noses allowed! Next, players push off from the wall and try to stand up again. If they have to take a step, they lose.

See the video. (Really, you'll want to see this.)
Or, opt for still photos. (Almost as good.)

How to win:
Competitors repeat play, gradually adding distance from the wall as they go. The first person to take a step loses.

The prize:
Upper body soreness for the next 24-36 hours. And a cookie!

The emerging sport has been submitted to the IOC for inclusion in the 2008 Bejing summer games.

Kat's still not famous...

2007-07-03T10:47:00.001-04:00

...but her brother is! Read the latest about Kat's remarkable brother and his illustrious pursuits, and realize why she felt overshadowed during most of her childhood.

Poser post-doc becomes actual post-doc

2007-06-04T14:48:00.000-04:00

Michael "Cap'n Hubert Sharkbait" Charette has been posing as a post-doc in the Baserga lab for several months now, but only recently has he actually earned his credentials. According to the Dalhousie News, the Cap'n and his wench donned their ship's colors to collect their PhD booty just this weekend.

Erica dated to the Jurassic period

2007-05-04T15:04:00.000-04:00

In a conciliatory gesture demonstrating that Erica, as the most senior member of the Baserga lab, may have indeed lost touch with the changing dynamic of C114, Erica has allowed Kat to post to the Baserga Lab website. As part of Erica's penance for holding on to a moderator monopoly, she has been banished to doing public service categorizing boxes of dead reptiles held in storage at the Peabody museum. While she claims to have volunteered for this post herself, the arrival of her parole officer Monday morning to make sure that she attended her first session spoke to the contrary. The Baserga lab eagerly awaits her return with some promised "dinosaur BBQ" as a peace offering.

Franziska referred to by her last name

2007-05-02T17:38:00.001-04:00

Because of her acute geniousity, Franziska has been interviewed as a feature in B Magazine. (See Vol. 8, Issue 1, page 7.) This is the first taste of stardom for Franziska, who has never before been referred to primarily by her last name. Since publication, she has begun to feel the effects of the limelight, insisting on only European chocolate in the candy drawer. (Apparently one bad kiss can spoil the bunch.)

Kat gets even with Bennett

2007-04-13T08:46:00.000-04:00

Not to be outdone by an undergrad (see previous entry), Kat writes, submits, and wins an NSF grant, all in one (business) week. "I'm thrilled about it," she says upon hearing of the reward. "I would have been really bummed if I had spent those four days writing a grant that didn't even get funded. What a waste of time that would have been!" She celebrated by sticking her tongue out at Bennett.

Bennett wins the lottery

2007-03-27T15:04:00.000-04:00

As reported in the Yale Daily News, Bennett has won $750,000 in the Yale Undergraduate Lottery. Open only to undergraduates, this isn't your typical "Pick 5" lottery, but entry requires a research proposal, an exceptional GPA, piles of professorial accolates, and a posthumous "A-OK" from Barry Goldwater. The money will be used to fund his research on elitist sports cars.

Lab Hazard Rating System

2006-07-25T13:56:00.000-04:00

We've been notified by the department of safety of a new Lab Hazard Rating System. Our lab rates as shown here.

High Rate of Turnover in Baserga Lab

2006-07-07T14:48:00.000-04:00

A catalyst, which remains elusive, is predicted to have caused a significantly higher rate of turnover than usual in the Baserga Lab. While the lab is experiencing a depletion of Kara, Sander, and Chewie, their absence is being suppressed by an upregulation of Kat and Bennett, as well as a temporary increase of Indira. Additionally, we have observed an increase of Susan in the lab, which may or may not be associated with the decrease of Kara. Continuing work seeks to quantify the increase in the turnover number, kcat, as well as to investigate a proposed link of the kcat to Kat.

Meet the new Basergas!

Kara aims higher (at skyscrapers)

2006-03-09T15:26:00.000-05:00

On the eve of her third wedding anniversary, Kara successfully defended her thesis, entitled "Human cloning: An ethically depraved exercise in elevated self-esteem." Her presentation demonstrated how she spent her first four years in the lab working to clone herself, so that she (and her clone) could get more work done. During her final year in the lab, she took advantage of this double efficiency to perform experiments in two labs at the same time.

"It was very helpful," Kara says, "to be able to send Kara-2 to New York for the elutriation experiments, while I stayed here and did some 35-S labeling." The lab agreed that Kara-2 helped Kara-1 complete an unprecedented amount of work, and asked to keep the clone. Unfortunately, Kara decided to take the clone with her to her post-doc position in New York. It seems Kara-2 has a penchant for 5th Avenue.

The Baserga lab will miss Kara-1, and hopes she'll come back to visit often.