Week five

 Happy Thursday and soon-to-be weekend :)

I was filled with anticipation for the commencement of my research project the entire week. Tomorrow, I will meet with the rest of the research group to start analyzing the retrieved wastewater. I was told we would utilize a salt solution to suspend the microplastics on the water's surface for direct retrieval- this way we can extract the most amount of microplastics. 

Unfortunately, I have begun having second thoughts about branching off into microbial digestion of plastics. I fear we are too far into the semester for me to adequately devote the necessary time and care for both microplastic analysis and biodegradation. If I am unable to utilize bacterial species to biodegrade particular types of plastics, I will certainly hit the ground running next semester to ensure I can do both. It is a massive bummer, but it is not set in stone yet, so I can still hope!

On a very cool and final note, I learned how to pour media into Petri dishes on Monday!!! Thank you Josh for being patient with me because some of the plates either received too much or too little media :') But we live and learn!