Hi everyone!
My name is Paula Pelayo, a rising third year and I am
conducting research this summer at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods
Hole, Massachusetts as part of the Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU)
program funded by the NSF. I am working in Dr. Julie Huber’s lab studying
microbes that live in hydrothermal vents. Dr. Huber and her lab go out to sea on
a research vessel called the Atlantis and they use a submersible called Alvin
to collect water samples form the sea floor. I am working directly with
Caroline Fortunato (Postdoc) and she has taught me so much about microbial life
and how we can use the DNA and RNA present in water samples to determine who is
there and what are they doing?
Woods Hole is a very small town but it is full of
scientists! Everybody here at the MBL is studying some form of marine life so
being here is amazing because I am exposed to a whole new world of biology that
I didn’t know existed. I live in a house right down the street from my lab with
all the girls in my program and other internships and it’s lots of fun. We
spend a lot of time at a cute coffee shop called Pie in the Sky, going to the
beach, playing volleyball, biking, taking a ferry to a nearby island, and even
swim at night with dinoflagellates.
My Lab is on the 3rd floor of the Lillie building
in the Josephine Bay Paul Center
Typical afternoon in Woods Hole
Went squid fishing on the Gemma
The Atlantis is a research vessel scientists use to conduct
research worldwide and is the only vessel equipped to carry Alvin. My PI has
gone on several expeditions on the Atlantis and has even gone to the sea floor
in Alvin.
This is Alvin the Human Occupied Vehicle (HOV) submersible!
It has room inside the titanium sphere for one driver and two scientists who
can use Alvin’s robot arms to collect samples.
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