Today was an exciting day for Corbin (the newest member of the O’Connell research team) as he started to work with our breast cancer cell for the first time! Corbin is a freshman and has been shadowing in the lab all semester. Normally, there is no way I would chance putting a cell line in a freshman’s hands. Cell culture is expensive and mistakes cost our lab time and money. However, this year is a really unique year in my lab. In the spring I will graduate all 4 senior members of my lab, which includes Daniel and Ryan, who have been on my team for 3 years now. With 4 honors thesis projects  and a capstone project  all being conducted in the lab this semester, I knew I wouldn’t be able to take on any shadowing students but I also knew I needed to spend time training new students so that work could continue next year after my seniors graduated. It’s a tough spot to be in.

Daniel and Ryan stepped up in ways I could have never imagined! They have taken on the task of allowing students to shadow their experiments and are now training students so that the next generation of O’Connell Oncogeniuses are ready to take over next fall! Daniel and Ryan embody what it means to be on a research team! These two young men are doing to do AMAZING things!

~Dr. O’Connell