• Question: what is your most succesful experiment and why?

    Asked by hazattack to Alexis, Dr D, Helen, Jasmine, Mario on 17 Jun 2013. This question was also asked by hannahgeeeee, jemblepie, megchant, vadher, faisal, dharik.
    • Photo: Andrew Devitt

      Andrew Devitt answered on 17 Jun 2013:

      Most research is based on loads of experiments. When you look at all the results, they can tell a story. But each experiment is really important.

      My most successful was the one that proved that a molecule (called CD14) on marophages (a ‘big eaater’ cell in humans) was responsible for eating dying cells.

      Why? Because I’d worked for 2 years to try and find out the identity of this molecule……. and I found out its identity one day, in Birmingham Uni, in a dark microscope room…….. then the celebrations started!

    • Photo: Alexis Barr

      Alexis Barr answered on 17 Jun 2013:

      I used to work on a disease called Microcephaly – where people have brains that are smaller than usual. We had found a gene, called CDK5RAP2, that was found to be mutated in some of these people. After working on this gene for 3 years, I finally did an experiment that showed that these cells had problems going through mitosis. This might mean that people with this mutation might not have enough stem cells in their brains and so wouldn’t be able to produce enough brain cells – meaning they had small brains.

    • Photo: Jasmine Penny

      Jasmine Penny answered on 24 Jun 2013:

      Interesting question! My most successful experiments are the ones I have finally got working after many attempts. Doing research can be finding out what doesn’t work just as much as finding out what does!

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