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| Me in Bruges |
I’ve been living in Leuven
for a week now and I have been quite busy with administrative chores ranging from registering as a visitor at city hall,
setting up Wi-Fi in my dorm, and completing a myriad of trainings to begin work
in the lab. Additionally, I’ve been spending a lot of time reading papers on my
research project.
Buzzwords like “personalized medicine” and “point-of-need”
medical care boil down to the need for fast, efficient, and cost-effective ways to
identify genes in a patient’s DNA. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is a method
that amplifies DNA for gene identification. However, PCR methods require
sophisticated lab equipment, expensive reagents, and have long wait times.
Many advancements have been made in lab-on-a-chip technology,
that is, using microchips with microfluidic reactors to perform PCR using the
tiniest pin-prick of blood or cells. But the initial purification of DNA remains
challenging to perform on a microchip without using a large, complex set-up. Alongside my mentor Rodrigo, we are refining the use of silicon
micropillars for on-chip sample preparation of bacteria, and testing its
efficacy using DNA concentration quantification methods and on-chip PCR assays.
Beyond work, I have been acclimating to Belgium life and exploring
the surrounding area. There are bikes everywhere, no water fountains, friendly
and laid-back people, and good bread. Everyone speaks English, but a lot of
signs, menus, etc. are in Flemish, a particular challenge for me, a vegetarian,
but I’ve been able to avoid catastrophe thus far.
Leuven is beautiful. Nestled between farmland, the
residential area I live and work is lush and green with wood pigeons cooing in
the trees. The city center is a quintessential European town complete with cobblestone
streets bursting with shops and restaurants. This weekend Christina and I
visited Bruges, Antwerp, and Brussels. Interwoven with canals, soaked with
sunshine, and a waffle shop every 50 ft, Bruges felt like the perfect place to
retire after a long and interesting life. Antwerp, cloudy and gritty, was the city
to sit at a cafe in a black turtleneck and smoke. Brussels was historic and
bustling and felt like the first truly big city I’d see in Belgium, fitting its
moniker as “the capital city of Europe”.
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| The view from my dorm room in Wisteria |
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