January 16, 2015

Today I sat down with my mentor to speak about my indivisual project that I will be working on. First my project will consist of the question,
     what is the difference between cancerous and non-cancerous cells?
1) to design better treatments.
2) stop pre-cancerous cells before they become harmful.
3) stop treating non invasive breats cancer cells, so we have time to spend on cancerous patience.

Our lab has found a new gene! (gene #5, changed the name for security purposes). We can test this gene by first copying the new gene using RNA extraction, and turning it into DNA to put the DNA with gene #5 into the cell and then observe what happens. But first we need to make sure this wasn't just a fluke. So my job in the lab is to check if this new cell line is an actually exsisting new gene or just an experimental fluke by using the methods of RNA extraction and qPCR.

1. RNA extraction:

• we will have a test tube containing everything from the cell including gene #5. 
• we add primer to attach to only gene #5 
• now we have the gene that we need and to replicate we use polymerase, but we can use RNA poymerase because it dose not work at the temperature of PCR. 
• so first we have to transoform RNA to DNA so we can use DNA polymerase at a lower temperature.  

2. PCR- Polymerase Chain Reaction 

• this process is used to amplify gene #5 at a temperature at 95℃

a) denature 

          b) add primer (short sequence that complements DNA)

          c)  DNA polymerase adds nucleotide bases