Amy's Fantastic Day

16 year old Amy Howarth, a year 11 student at Stalham High School, describes a rather special science day ...

'I spent an exciting, interesting day working alongside Dr. Kay Yeoman, a research scientist in the School of Biological Sciences at the UEA. The visit was organised by one of my science teachers at school, he has Dr. Yeoman as his 'Science Partner'. My teacher spends part of his week working in the School of Education so he was able to take me into the University and then take me into the Biology Laboratory to meet Dr. Yeoman.

I spent the first part of the morning being shown around the labs, I met all the members of the research team and was given an explanation as to what everyone was doing. I went back to Dr. Yeoman's lab where the task for my day was explained, this was the preparation of some DNA. It is possible to remove small sections of DNA from the plasmid of a cell using certain enzymes. We were then able to clone this and produce some DNA of our own. At this point we made some cultures and I was shown how to make different types of Agar jelly. This jelly was used so I could see the pattern of the DNA which I had cloned in some bacteria. We took a picture of the DNA with a special computer. Although she had demonstrated the cloning of the DNA just for me it was a technique that is used a great deal in the research they are doing, which is to try and get plants to produce their own nitrogen with the aid of certain bacteria. It was a fantastic day, a day I certainly will remember for a long time. One of the things that amazed me was the amount I understood, I thought that I wouldn't understand anything. Next year I am going to study Sciences at A level and then hopefully follow some form of science course at University. Thank you ever so much Dr. Yeoman for your time and Professor Johnston for allowing me to work in your Department.'

Such opportunities are not the focus of TSN opportunity, whose primary aim is to support teachers, but the Nuffield Science Bursaries, facilitates 4-week long placements in the labs of JIC, IFR and UEA and is open to all Y12 pupils for the summer before they begin Year 13 (local details here).