Vidha Srivastava’s Journey as an Undergraduate Researcher in Plant Molecular Biology
The beginning of a journey is always uncertainty, but with uncertainty comes hope. Vidha Srivastava, a 3rd-year student pursuing her Bachelors in Botany shared her experience with us.
I interned at the Department of Plant Molecular Biology, University of Delhi under the care of Prof. Girdhar Pandey for a period of 8 weeks. My objective was to acquire hands-on experience of techniques used in plant molecular biology studies. But what I actually ended up learning was far more beyond those techniques.
A typical day would involve me reporting at the lab at around 9:15 and straight-up going to the growth room where we would raise our plants. Task 1, regardless of everything, was to observe my plants, check their growth, see if they’re doing alright and when will they next need some water and nutrients. After that, it was on my mentor, Ms. Barkha Ravi, a PhD scholar to a lot me tasks and teach me how various techniques are used.
In the discourse, I learned about the nitty gritty of PCR, electrophoresis, DNA and RNA extraction and manipulation (restriction, ligation), transformation, tissue culture, etc. A bigger learning was that experiments fail. They mostly fail. But researchers don’t cry over that, they troubleshoot. They revisit, optimize and give it another crack.
My day would end after 6:30. But like I said, there was more to that. In our lab, we used to hold ‘Lab Meetings’ every Thursday, where Pandey Sir would talk to us about our problems and guide us. We would have one paper presentation and one work presentation every in the meeting. And I too gave one at the end of my term.
I learnt a lot from those meetings – what are the challenges a researcher faces, how can one tackle that, and how the equipments and reagents in the lab are everybody’s shared responsibility.
To a third person, it might sound weird, but I did learn a lot of maintenance work in the lab. I have assisted my mentor is cleaning our lab, defrosting our fridges and just overall maintaining the sanctity of work space.
I made two great friends, fellow interns, Pragya and Shreya who are both academically senior, and therefore great guiding friends besides being the people I ate, travelled, laughed and did Yoga with (Yes! In the department, on International Yoga Day!)
What I learned in those two months was beyond experiments, of course now I am at better ease when I work in my lab at the college, and I can think through my experiments, but more than that what I cherish is that I have become a better person overall.
And this little story, can never convey enough thanks to Pandey Sir or my teacher Dr. Smita Tripathi who sent me on this life-changing venture.
