This summer I worked in the Biochemistry Department under the advisement of Scientist David Wood. We worked collaboratively on experiments for method development for protein purification. The current method for protein purification had not been fully investigated. We identified how much of each variable was needed for optimum protein purification. Our method studies will save scientists time and money. Our goal was to identify a process that could be transferred to different proteins with different protease requirements. Mr. Wood is going to do a few more experiments to further investigate the method we investigated this summer. I published all of my experiments internally with Pfizer and Mr. Wood presented my findings to his colleagues in the beginning of August. The experiments will be published in a journal this fall when all the experiments are done.

Not only did I get to perform my own experiments, but I also got to tour different department at Pfizer and sit in on different meetings with the scientists. All of these things combined gave me valuable insight into how the scientific community operates in the business world. It was extremely interesting to listen to how scientists bounced ideas off of each other for experiments. It is exactly what we are trying to get our students in high school to do with their peers. Scientists also defend their experiments to their colleagues; another valuable tool we are teaching our students to do with their peers. The scientists also listened and investigated criticisms from their peers. I believe this is one of the hardest tools for any person in any profession to do. I may not be able to show my students how I did the experiments at Pfizer, but I will be able to adapt my teaching techniques to have them model what is going on in the real world.