Science in the City

At school on Tuesday, we had many, but not all of the components we needed to run the DNA extraction as I had done at james Cook University. Instead of ethanol, we had access to the less drink-able ethanol. There was no TBE to elute the DNA, so we had to use warm distilled water. The mortars we had were waaay too big for 100mg of plant tissue. But improvising like a chef in a mobile home kitchenette, we crushed the cells directly in the Eppendorf, and made do the best we could. The kids did a great job handling the many steps, and eventually, we were done for the day. What I projected to complete in an hour had taken two with all the improvisations and make-do needed, but whether we had succeeded or not, we had attempted the first ever extraction of genomic seagrass DNA in a NYC public school…..I think I can say that without fear of contradiction!