Warning: Not for the faint-hearted
In our group we are mainly working with different human and animal biosamples including blood and urine. What you might not know is that for the lucky(?!) few we have stool samples to work on too! Now I know what you are thinking, you’re a little disgusted…I was thinking the same at first but I’m actually really lucky as my project revolves around babies and baby stool just seems less gross…right?
I studied microbiology for my undergraduate degree and have been interested in gut microbiota ever since. I think it’s a fascinating subject which I used to try to talk to my non-scientific friends about but they always looked massively awkward…Thankfully I have many scientists to talk to at IC and medic student housemates who don’t even blink an eye!
Recently, I have been working with preterm infant’s stool samples and got hold of some meconium (a baby’s first ever stool). I’m not going to lie; it has the consistency of snot and tar mixed together…BLURGH. However, I’m very excited to get it into the NMR and have a look at the metabolite profile! I’ll let you know how it goes next time!
Well, I had better get back to report writing!
Chat later,
Fran