Megan Thees

February 24, 2017

BIOL&212

Research Project Blog Assignment #2

Our project did not turn out as expected. Before much research we decided to test the hypothesis that protein content would vary within the same organism but raised in different environments, farm raised vs free range or wild caught. We predicted that wild caught or free range animals would have more protein content than their farm raised counterparts because they are able to move more freely in their environment. We found research articles that supported this, as seen in Research Project Blog Assignment #1. After running the protein gel electrophoresis we found little to no differences between Factory Farmed Chicken and “Free Range” Chicken, Farm Raised Shrimp and Wild Caught Shrimp, and Farm Raised Milkfish and Wild Caught Milkfish. We had the opportunity to start over and create a new experiment but we decided that that wouldn't be very “sciency” of us. You don’t just throw data away because you didn’t find what you were looking for. So we decided to repeat the same gel to see if maybe we had made a mistake the first go around. No, we pretty much got the same results. We are not letting this get us down! We are going to present on the finding that we have researched on this topic and use our data to summarize other findings. 

  My questions for other groups are: Did your experiment turn out the way you thought it would? If it didn’t, did you redo it or completely start over? If it did turn out the way you expected, did you also discover other interesting findings? If it did not turn out the way you expected were you able to still use your data for other outcomes? My advise for groups that are in a similar situation as my group, is to repeat the same experiment, we are not professional scientists, mistakes could have occurred during the first gel run. I also strongly stand by the idea of not throwing away data just because it did not turn out the way you wanted it to. Use that data to describe other findings or research how other people were able to support your hypothesis. For error analysis, our group will discuss the fact that even though the label from the grocery store says the organism is “wild caught”, it may not be. Or even though the chicken says it is “free-range”, we have found articles that state, just because they are “free-range” does not mean that they are out in an open pasture. Although they are not raised in cages, their space is still very confined with limited ability to actually get outside.