S-STEM Scholar Melanie Castaneda's Blog

  Tuesday October 25, 2022  Making Media: On Tuesday, we were asked to make media for the microbiology department. There were five different types of media that my partners and I were asked to make. On this day, we began by making the first three. We first filled test tube racks with test tubes. Each test tube had a Durham tube placed inside with the open side down. Phenol Red Manitol Broth 2L: 21 g per liter of Di Water  Stir to dissolve the Use a beaker to dispense/pour media into tubes Cover the Durham tube with media  This is approximately 7 ml  Place cap on loosely  Label the test tube rack clearly with tape I used one on each of the longer sides and one piece of tape across the top of the tubes Phenol Red Sucrose 2L:  21 g per liter  Stir to dissolve the Use a beaker to dispense/pour media into tubes Cover the Durham tube with media  This is approximately 7 ml  Place cap on loosely  Label the test tube rack clearly with tape I...

  Tuesday, October 18, 2022  Making TSA:  Did measurements from 1 Liter to 500 mL  20 g of Tryptic Soy Agar  For the slants added 1 g of agar  Placed 20 g of TSA into a beaker containing 100 ml of D.I. Water  Put beaker onto hot plate and stirred it  Wanted it to be hot and molten but never boiling  Wanted to keep it spinning  Made sure everything was dissolved completely before removing from the hot plate Once it was completely dissolved, we removed it from the hot plate and began to pipette  6 ml into each tube  If it began to solidify, switch out pipette and put the TSA back onto the hot plate, spin until it is a liquid again and can continue to be used   Placed lids onto each test tube  Test tubes were then autoclaved  Friday, October 21, 2022  Plating:  On Friday, my partners and I learned how to plate. We used the gels that we had made last Friday October 14, 2022. The gels contained LB Broth...

  Thursday, October 13, 2022 Making LB Broth for E. coli   On Thursday, we came in and learned how to make LB broth for E. coli . We were given the recipe to make 1 liter of broth and asked to make the conversions for the amounts necessary in order to make 200 ml and 100 ml of broth. The difference between them is that for the 100 ml concentration, we added Agar to the mix. The amounts necessary to make 1 liter of broth are included in the first table, Figure 1.1. Figure 1.2 contains the amounts necessary to make 200 ml of broth. In Figure 1.3, I have included the amounts necessary to make the LB broth with agar for 100 ml concentration.   Recipe for 1 Liter of Broth Ingredients Amount  Tryptone  10 g  Yeast Extract  5 g Sodium Chloride  10 g D.I. Water  Up to 1 liter  Figure 1.1 Recipe for 200 ml  Material Amount  Tryptone  2 g  Yeast Extract  1 g Sodium Chloride  2 g D.I. Water  Up to 200 ml...