Whew! We are all just recovering from the Maker Faire weekend. It was a pretty intense two days of public interaction. But we won the Editors' Choice award- pretty good for our first Maker Faire outing.
We joined forces with Ben Dubin-Thaler and the BioBus, a mobile science classroom housed in a carbon-neutral vegetable oil-burning renovated 1970s San Francisco Transit bus. Yes, the outside of the bus has a kind of retro-70s vibe to it. But inside is where the magic really happened.
The BioBus folks provided some ultracool microscopy and we provided some DIY genotyping. Folks could come in, look at their own cheek cells magnified 400x on a phase-contrast microscope connected to a digital display screen, and then extract their DNA for PCR and restriction enzyme analysis of the TASR38 gene which determines the ability to taste a bitter compound called PTC. Tasting is dominant and non-tasting is recessive, so it was not only a lesson in personal genomics but also Medelian inheiritance. The space is compact, and the bus was stuffed with people checking us out all weekend long.
Ben explaining subcellular structure.
Our setup. We had a PCR machine, microfuge, heat block, and gel electrophoresis equipment (on a side bench). The hardest part was keeping the hordes of wee ones from grabbing the pipetmen and tubes off the table if we didn't pay attention.
We genotyped more than forty individuals during the course of the weekend. We took their email addresses and the gel photos with the test results will be posted for them to see later this week (we didn't have the time to do the electrophoresis step on the bus- we were constantly doing the DNA extraction with new volunteers).
Sung explaining Mendelian inheiritance to a father and son who genotyped themselves.
Sung with Nurit's DNA
Outside the bus, we had a great attraction for kids of all ages- extracting DNA from strawberries. It's colorful and messy, so we were mobbed from the opening moments of the Faire until closing down on Sunday. We had to run out to neighborhood bodegas multiple times to resupply ourselves with strawberries and rubbing alcohol. We even went through an entire carton of salt and a bottle of meat tenderizer.
Dan entertains the crowd:
James Jorasch from ScienceHouse tries his hand at strawberry DNA extraction.
The Faire itself was fantastic (although we could've done without the deafening roar that periodically emanated from the Jet Ponies- we were WAY too close to that attraction for comfort). We'll post more pictures of the Faire later, after we catch our collective breath!
