RM's+Week+of+February+19,+2008

RM's Logbook


 * Monday, February 18, 2008**

Yes, we poor souls had to come to school on this national holiday. So, as I was absent on the previous Thursday and Friday, I had to update my logbook with new pages and links. Again, I am experiencing some technical difficulties, though not nearly as extreme as before. This time, I cannot insert links on the main logbook page; therefore, I have created access through the week of February 11. Our class discussed the CERN trip last Wednesday; however, I am not able to participate due to prior commitments.


 * Tuesday, February 19, 2008**

I left my lab book in my car; therefore, I couldn't finish reading a packet that Dr. Sarveswaran gave me. However, I did look at a few news articles online about self-assembling DNA structures. About 2 years ago, researchers at Duke University were able to create DNA grids, similar to what we are doing. They have not yet been able to create a grid on a functional circuit board. However, the main difference between what they've done and what we're doing is that we're attempting to build a structure on top of silicon, which is used right now to make circuit boards. [|Here's] the article website.


 * Wednesday, February 20, 2008**

DL was not in class today, but he sent an e-mail with a short assignment. Thus, I did a little research and brought back to mind how lunar eclipses occur and why they occur during full moons. I worked on the answer and sent out an e-mail to the rest of the class on these points. Next, I updated my logbook. Also, I will be going into the ND lab tomorrow.


 * Thursday, February 21, 2008**

Today, I went into the lab. I did not have any new, clean samples, so I transferred my images into my own folder. Then, I flattened them and turned the into tiff files. AL showed me how to do this, and then he and Dr. Sarveswaran showed me how to conduct analyses on my images. For example, I could analyze the cross sections of the the sample surface and I could find the horizontal width and height of a point on the surface (usually DNA). Next, I analyzed the roughness of a couple of the samples and saved these new images in my folder. The only troubling thing that occurred was that I could not find the images of my mica samples. I have the clean silicon samples, the silicon samples with APTES, and the silicon samples with APTES and DNA; however, the plain mica samples and the mica with DNA samples were not found.

I'm not participating in the science fair being held in March because these past months have been spent learning the basics. Only recently have I been preparing samples on my own and using the AFM and the software without much help. Only today did I learn a few important techniques for analyzing samples. So, if I work on this project over the summer, I should have enough new material to present for a science fair next year.


 * Friday, Februay 22, 2008**

Today, I'm reading the responses people sent about the lunar eclipse. I did not get to view the eclipse, unfortunately. I'm also updating my logbook, adding links and creating new pages.

Week of February 11

Week of February 25