IBH Barbeque! (Matt Grobis)

Hello all!

So finally an entry that isn't about how much work we've had or how stressed I am. Today was the IBH barbeque that Dr. Cheeseman promised at the start of the year (don't worry - the reason it was today was because we forgot for a few months :-P). I walked to ISR to meet Darcy and saw Jess on the way. We walked together and met with three juniors in IBH when we got close. A few minutes later, we entered Dr. Cheeseman's back yard. It was awesome. His backyard has a big variety of different plants and the food was great. I've never been to a barbeque with such a diversity of food. Most of it was stuff I had never had, either, like Greek spinach pie or this type of plant that tastes like licorice. We had delicious liquid nitrogen ice cream, too, which was a necessity at such a science-y get-together. Everything was great... it was beautiful out, Dr. Cheeseman's wife was really nice, and everyone was just in a great mood.

It was really nice hanging out with these people I've stressed out with and worked all hours of the day with. We all swapped nerdy bio jokes and talked about our summer plans, what we were doing later that day, and just about anything really. I can tell that these are folks I'll be talking to years from now... Cally bought pizza Thursday evening / Friday morning and I couldn't break a $5 so I told her I'd pay for the IBH get-together in 20 years. We pinky-swore on it so I guess it's undeniably happening. I'm looking forward to saying "oh yeah, I knew so and so. We were in IBH together." Some day, some day...

Here's to more events like these :-)

-Matt

April's Here! (Matt Grobis)

Hi!

Phew, what a hard week... and right after the typical "tough week before spring break," too. The week before spring break, we had two lab reports due in IB 271 in addition to a lab report due in CHEM 237. I got some last-minute Sears lab work and had stuff in my other classes, too, so it was a loooong week. I slept like ten hours a day during break just catching up :-) (it was glorious). We came back to an open-note take-home exam that I figured wouldn't be too bad because I had studied over break. Yeah right! Every time I underestimate IBH I generally get my butt kicked... that exam took a cumulative nine hours. When that was finally finished, it was 5:00am Wednesday morning and I scraped together a few hours of sleep before my 10am.

Then in bio lab, while most of us are brain-dead and exhausted, Dr. Cheeseman announces that in this lab, we have to design our own procedure to answer a question on differential GAPDH activity in green and not-green sections of leaves. We knew we'd be re-doing the first experiment of the semester as a way to check how well we took notes in our lab journals, but the "design your own procedure" made me want to put my head in my hands and sleep/cry/etc. It was tough. But, my group collaborated, we pushed each other, and we got it done. Then that night I slaved at a chem lab report and designing a procedure for a final project synthesis. I was so tired. But I got through it.

The week's over and I'm looking forward to some beautiful sleep, watching season 2 LOST (I'm getting caught up!), writing creatively a bit, and just relaxing. Oh yeah, and doing plenty of homework of course.

On a non-homework-related note, I'm pretty happy with stuff. Classes are interesting, warm weather is lovely, karate yesterday was really fun, I have a sub-lease for this summer pretty much set up, I won $1100 scholarship for my 3-week study abroad in Africa this summer, things are good with the girlfriend... it's all good. All the work may be tough, but I'm learning a lot and feel I'm getting a lot smarter. With sophomore year drawing to a close, I'm comparing myself to who I was in that car going home at the end of freshman year and I wonder how I could say I knew much about biology at all... especially the experiment side of it. Yay IBH. Well now I'm really tired so I'm going to lie down... then Chipotle at 3:00 with the other karate instructors. Can't wait!

-Matt

New IBH Kids Coming In (Matt Grobis)

Hello!

So interviews for IB Honors are this week and I'm excited to see some fresh faces excited about biology :-) . This semester's been going well; I'm working in the Sears research lab and taking IBH and orgo labs so pretty much any day of the week 1-5pm I'm in some lab, haha. It's good though. At yesterday's lab meeting, the post-doc Lisa talked about this really interesting project idea she has regarding the evolution of mammalian hearing. Depending on the type of work she'd be doing, there's a chance I'll be joining her soon. I'm really excited... besides that, though, I'm learning lab techniques like in-situ hybridizations to analyze the opossum embryos and I'm learning to manage the opossum colony in the basement. That's one on the right if you're curious.

The longer I'm in IBH, the more I love it. The small class size can't be stressed enough. It's amazing. U of I is a huge place and it's hard to feel connected to the people around you when you see them for one semester in one of your classes and then never see them again. In IB Honors, though, I see the same people MWF every week for hours, and the core is extensive enough that I see them in pretty much all my other classes too. It makes U of I feel much smaller when you're working on that tough orgo problem set with your lab partners or comparing labs that look interesting or just seeing these people on the Quad. You can't help but become close because of all the time you end up spending with them. And everyone in IBH is so interesting... you don't leap into this major without loving biology (hopefully!), and so everyone has something interesting to add to a conversation. During last Wednesday's lab, some IBHers and I got into a discussion on the global warming "debate" (more so why some people - particularly those receiving funding from companies who would suffer from stricter emissions regulations - are taking such measures to deny global warming), possible evolutionary explanations for a belief in God, and even just our favorite books. For a school as enormous as U of I, this keeps me sane.

Well, I better get going. And to any students interested in IBH that are reading this before next week's interviews: good luck! Just relax and let your love for biology shine through.

-Matt

Into a new semester... (Matt Grobis)

Hi prospective IBH students!

After a long winter break to digest everything that had happened last semester, and after almost three weeks into this semester, I finally feel ready to contribute something meaningful here.

IB Honors is amazing. I'm in the perfect major. It's a huge challenge but you're in an environment that will help you achieve your goals. I've learned that IBH makes scientists. In other biology classes, you learn a lot about a certain topic. You go to lecture, listen, memorize facts and learn theories that coordinate those facts, and then you get tested and hopefully walk away with some of that information sticking around. In IBH, though, you're not only taught the facts - you're taught to evaluate them for yourself and to think critically. We read scientific articles last semester not just to learn something but to look at what we had previously learned and evaluate the information in a new context. And this semester, we learned about glycolysis and the kreb's cycle over two days in a really thought-provoking, step-by-step analysis of WHY this is happening, not just what was happening. We had to really think about every step of the process and not just memorize them. This, I feel, is how biology should be taught - not memorized from a book, but processed, challenged, and then finally laid to rest.

One bit of advice, though: IB Honors is amazing, no doubt. But as is the case with any time commitment, make sure you have the time to devote to it. IB, Orgo, and calc II last semester was really, really hard. I had a long and painful semester with those 12 credit hours alone (not including the psych class I took, which was minimal work compared to those behemoths) and I couldn't fully devote myself to orgo or calc. This semester, I cut it back quite a bit and I am much happier. I'm finding time to write creatively, devote myself to the lab I recently joined, and write meaningful lesson plans for the karate classes I help teach. Just having some breathing room makes a big difference. If you can handle a tough schedule, by all means go for it. Just know that IBH is going to take up quite some time outside of the 11-12 MWF and 1-5W :-)

Well, I better get going. In 7.5 hours I'm expected at Morrill to get trained to handle animals so I can start taking care of the possum colonies for my lab. Hope things are well with you, whoever is reading this. Good night!

-Matt

New Semester, New Tactics

Hi! This is the first post of Darcy Ross, a sophomore in the IB Honors program. To the left is a picture of an owl in flight, effortlessly gliding through the winter air. I find it inspiring, when all I want to do is hibernate through the winter.

Let me start out by saying that over one semester, IBH has shifted my course in life quite drastically and pointed me toward opportunities previously unfathomable. Perhaps even more significantly, the people in this program, both faculty and students, have served to fuel my enthusiasm about biology and the places it is taking me. IBH is a place where ideas take wing to the promised land of reality, and I am ever grateful for it.

That said, IB 270 rocked my world. The amount of work I put into that class, especially when it came to the Discovery Project, was orders of magnitude more than anything I had previously ŭndertaken. This was partly because of the challenges it inherently presented, and partly because I loved it so much that I would rather spend time on IB than on my Japanese or Orgo classes. Organic Chemistry in particular is a selfish beast, and retaliated against my neglect quite fiercely.

This semester, I seek a more balanced schedule. I decided to push physics back a semester, leaving me with only 13 credit hours (gasp!). I wanted to excel in my courses and spend more time in a lab (gaining some more credits, thankfully) so that I could start work on an independent project soon. That's what I told my parents, at least. It is all true, but I am also exploring a philosophy that I've often enjoyed reading about from the Study Hacks blog. Study Hacks is written by Cal Newport, MIT student and now post-doc, who investigated the study habits of straight-A students.

The main idea I'm trying to follow is his Zen Valedictorian philosophy. His summary of the philosophy:

If you understand…

• your interests and values,
• the psychology of impressiveness, and
• how to be productive and study efficiently,

then you can construct a student lifestyle that is…

• relaxed and free of chronic stress,
• intellectually engaging,
• wildly social and exciting, and
• just as impressive as if you had followed the path of the grind.

We can sum this all up in the following pithy motto:

Do Less. Live More. Get Ahead.

By purposely underscheduling my coursework, I will focus on other things that are fulfilling to me and often still productive in my career as a student: my Esperanto club; writing for the Journal of Young Investigators; writing bad poetry; doing yoga; having chats with some of the amazing, influential people just wandering nonchalantly on this campus; finding a topic for my senior thesis that truly interests me; reading; and in general exploring who I am and who I want to be. Now doesn't that sound fun?

As long as I strike the right balance, my GPA will benefit as well. I don't for one moment plan on slacking off--I am setting the goals higher this semester. I should be able to do better in my classes without just spending more time on them. I have much anecdotal evidence that a rested, happy mind is a smarter one, an example being: One night last semester, I accidentally got a full night's rest before my 8 AM Japanese class. My new-found comprehension, participation, and alertness startled me. I wonder which exams and other projects from last semester could have benefited from such a remedy. I want this state to be the norm, and I see no reason it won't be.

What are your goals this semester? Do you have any advice for other students?

The Discovery Projects are done and we are on break!

Hello, everyone! This one's from Cassie, class of 2012...
As the fall semester transitions into winter break, I am really glad to have found time to post to our IBH blog!

The presentations of the IB 270 Discovery Projects were given the week before finals, and they were all very impressive. First off, it was really comforting to know that people outside of our class came to see our presentations. A group of similarly interested people all gathering to see the culmination of our semester's work with the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans really made the presentations fun to give. Since this was also a pizza party/presentation hybrid, it was double the fun! From the infection rate of pseudomonas in C. elegans to the chemotaxis of C. elegans in the presence of different alcohols, our Discovery Projects explored a whole range of interesting topics regarding the effects of RNA interference in C. elegans.

For the Discovery Projects, our lab groups had to develop a novel hypothesis regarding the effects of RNA Interference on a gene within the C. elegans genome. At the beginning of the semester, we researched scientific literature in order to formulate our hypotheses, methods, and expected results.Once we had created a solid proposal for the experiment, we started to see how our regular class labs were related to this independent project. With our Mendelian genetics lab, we learned the body morphology of C. elegans, their reproductive systems, and how to classify certain mutant phenotypes. Armed with our knowledge about these soil-dwelling organisms, we then moved onto a DNA lab where we learned molecular techniques such as PCR and DNA sequencing with the Sequencher program. After the completion of the RNA Interference Lab, we had successfully learned how to make NGM (nematode growth medium) plates and then seed those plates with bacteria. We then learned the intricate details of RNA Interference, and how it would be working to knock out the genes chosen for our respective Discovery Projects. These labs were crucial building blocks that guided our projects throughout the semester. Many thanks to Nick and Miranda (our teaching assistants) for preparing those labs for us, and to Professor Whitfield for teaching us everything about C. elegans, RNA Interference, and the research process!

I've never been through a class where everything culminates so fluidly to an important group project presentation. I really felt like I had invested the entire semester in this project. Not only was class time utilized, but time outside of class was a necessity for getting these projects done on time. All of us had the same common goal--to execute this experiment as best as we could, and that meant putting in a ton of extra time. This was perfectly fine with me considering all of the fun times that were had in NHB this semester.

It's the most gratifying feeling to know that all of our fun and hard work intertwined to fabricate our scientific aspirations into a tangible design. Plus, those presentations weren't so scary once I realized that we really were all in this together. I am sure that the rest of my class is as excited for the rest of what the IBH program has to offer for the upcoming semesters. From one semester alone, my outlook regarding a career in biology has evolved from a genuine interest into a sincere passion that I will undoubtedly follow for the rest of my life. With IB 270, we delved further into biological applications, previously unknown details of molecular biology, and a wealth of laboratory techniques. All of the knowledge gained from lecture, lab, our professor, teaching assistants, and each other accumulated into a reserve of inspiration to further explore the biological world. Joining IBH was the best decision that I made at UIUC so far, and I truly look forward to my future academic adventures with the program.

After a long winter break, here we come, IB 271!
Cassie

The Semester's Almost Over! (Matt Grobis)

Hello!

With Thanksgiving over and preparations being made to return to U of I tomorrow, I'm realizing that there's a week and a half of classes left. Then finals and... it's over. Whoa, hold on a second. I remember several points during the semester when I'd look at an Allenotes in my dorm (Allen Hall) and see that it was week 8, or week 10. The semester was one enormously long stretch until about halfway through, and then the next few weeks flew by. Crazy...

This semester has changed me, I think. I feel a little burned out... I actually laughed a few days ago when I asked myself if I really want to go to graduate school. What would the other option be? Stay home and play video games? Try to make a rock band and play drums for a living? Sure, those are sources of immediate gratification, but what's down the line? Deprived of biology long enough, I'm sure I'd start itching to learn more about how the world works. This all reminds me of that concept from introductory psychology... it's like, people have "lists" of desired activities, and things that are normally low on the list can actually move up if one doesn't do them frequently. The opposite thing can happen for things that one does very frequently. People take for granted their health until it's jeopardized... then, it's the most important thing in the world to them.

Anyway, this is a tremendous deviation from the point of this post. I feel burnt out because I've tried so hard and met such resistance, especially from organic chemistry... I'll be glad when it's over. And I'll be glad when this semester is over, but not because I'll be done with my classes. I feel that I have learned so much this fall, maybe more so than the entire last year. Finishing this semester will put a cap on everything that I've done so far and let me finally get closure on the last few months. IB Honors has been intense but it's been a flood of information and experiences that I want and that have helped me understand the world.

It was nice to return home and be able to put the books aside and do whatever I wanted with no obligations for a few days. After a while, though, I started getting that familiar uncomfortable feeling like I should be doing something worthwhile. This, I feel, is the reason I want to go to graduate school. It's easy to get lost in the work, sleep deprivation, and occasional frustration. The whole point of why one is doing something can be hard to hold onto. I want to pave the way into unfamiliar territory, into concepts that are still unclear and the textbooks avoid. I want to do something that others will read about and say, "wow." When I was in high school, in my final reflective paper in English I wrote that I wanted to change the world. Coming to college, I see that changing the world is going to be a bit harder than I anticipated. But give me time.

-Matt