(May 13, 2012)
FINAL BLOG

The science internship this year at Ecovative was such a great experience. I know that at first I was worried about having to go every week, making enough time for it, and them having enough for me to do. I did, however, have plenty to do over the seven month time span. I started out by just observing my mentor, Amanda, and reading from my mushroom book. By the end, though, I was working in the lab, sometimes even without her. I really felt like a part of the Ecovative team. By the end I was so used to bringing up new techniques and ideas with Amanda, and even some of her coworkers, who were also open to hear anything that I was thinking. I loved how encouraged I was to converse with everyone. Though this was challenging to get used to in the beginning (they are so smart there, and I was a little intimidated), I have learned to see myself as an important part of the team. One of my favorite experiments from the internship was actually my last one, when I made a free-form flower pot, which is completely compostable. I will be taking it home this summer and I can not wait to test it out! I think that the whole idea of going off campus to do an internship with a real company is such a unique and exciting experience and privilege. I have learned so much about the inner workings of a company like Ecovative, and how people think and create in an environment like that. A little advice to anyone who wants to do an internship next year, especially at Ecovative is to be totally open to new ideas. Use your creativity to think of new products and be willing to work with others easily. It is ok to be a little intimidated at first because they are so smart, but don’t let that get in the way of your experience there. Converse, innovate, and immerse yourself in everything that is science! Good Luck!

(April 25th, 2012)

       This is my last post because my internship is finished! I can't believe it is already done. Because it was the very last day Amanda and I just looked over some information that I wanted to use in my presentation. I was also able to see some of the last of my products that I had made last week. My ducks and flower pot turned out nicely!

(April 18th, 2012)
     This was definitely a fun internship day! Because we are coming so close to the end of the year and my own internship, Amanda decided that we could do some fun molded pieces. She designed a sort of "dough" material, almost like silly putty, but this has special compostable ingredients. We were really only testing to see how moldable it was and how well it stayed together. To test this we decided to mold the "dough" into different tools. We made Buddhas, mushrooms, ducks, flower pots, and freeform "dough". We played around with our creativity the entire time. Hopefully, when I go back this week I will see the final pieces!

(April 12, 2012)
       Last week I had inoculated some liquid media in order to mix with the substrate, but when I came back this time I found that it had again become contaminated, and we needed to throw it away. Though I was bummed that I couldn't continue with that experiment, Amanda assured me that a contamination like that actually occurs frequently. So instead, we took some of the finished parts and tested them in a machine called an instron. This measures flexibility and strength, by applying pressure, to each piece of our "eco-friendly foam". I tested some of my finished products and was surprised to see that some of them were actually pretty strong. I was even able to bring two pieces of my product back! I will try and show them to everyone at our next meeting!

(April 4, 2012)

      I received some results back from my inoculated liquid media from last week. I was going to mix it in with the substrate this week, but instead it got contaminated! I was bummed because I couldn't go on with that part of the experiment and we had to redo the media. Because what we had originally planned wasn't going to happen, we had some time to explore some more of the lab. I sat in on some other parts of people's experiments (super secret, so I am sorry I can't talk about them!) and they were very interesting. I feel pretty comfortable talking with the others so it was interesting and informative to exchange ideas about that experiment. Hopefully my results with the liquid media will be much better this week.

(March 28, 2012)
      It was definitely a busy day! First, I inoculated some more liquid media, this time with ground up sunflower seeds, so that I can mix it with the substrate for next week. Then, I mixed the inoculated media with sunflower seeds, from last week, with the substrate and filled up some tools. I am hoping to have these results next time. I have still been preparing a lot of my materials by myself, which has been lots of fun.
      Because I have only been in this building for a couple of visits, I am still exploring the lab and trying to familiarize myself with it the best I can before I have to leave again. This has been going well, especially because of how much more organized it is!

(March 21, 2012)
       We are switching up the experiments a little bit. We finished all of our sunflower seeds mixed with dry substrate and millet before spring break. So, we have moved on to sunflower seeds in inoculated liquid media! We will have to wait until next week to mix it with the substrate. To inoculate the liquid media we have to put sunflowers in the jar with the liquid for a little bit. Then, we put that liquid into a blender where we mix it with our mycelia. Inoculation is simply mixing our mycelia with the liquid media, which can have a jell-o like consistency. Though inoculating the dry millet from before was almost the same, inoculating with liquid is so much better!

       The other major news of this week is that we have officially moved to the new building, which is actually just behind the original. So much more space to experiment. How exciting!