Imaging & Microscopy→

Microscopy is where Jessica's two research chapters meet. In Enugu it meant light microscopy of bacterial isolates cultured from poultry feed during her B.Sc. project. At G.E.R.N. it means immunofluorescence staining of primary chondrocytes, read through high-content single-cell image analysis. The scale changed and the discipline did not. Her technical skills list immunofluorescence staining, cryosectioning and high-content single-cell image analysis alongside microbial enumeration and identification, which is an unusual pairing to hold in one pair of hands. Image analysis is now the larger part, since the readout of her thesis is what a stained chondrocyte looks like after a cytokine has acted on it. She contributed to the assay development and protocol design that produce those images. Acquisition settings, in her hands, are treated as part of the result rather than a preliminary to it.