JS Genetics Field Trip 2019

The Junior Sophister Genetics Field Trip took place in Kippure Estate in Wicklow from Thursday 28 February to Friday 1 March, and, while it was not really a field trip, it was excellent - simultaneously one of the best conferences and one of the best social events I've gone to. 

Academic
Every student in the class prepared a 10 minute presentation on a paper from our lit review, so we all had different topics that we were each very knowledgeable on, and presented it over the two days. Mine was on the 2017 paper 'Mother's curse neutralizes natural selection against a human genetic disease over three centuries', which is about how a mitochondrially-transmitted mutation causing the degenerative eye disease LHON has been maintained in the population because it mainly affects males and mother's curse means that because mitochondria are (almost) never transmitted by males, natural selection ignores the effect on males. I was also randomly chosen along with two other students to chair one of the sessions, which entailed introducing people, getting the powerpoint up on the projector, timing them, and asking questions. I'm a pretty experienced public speaker so chairing was definitely more stressful, especially since it took me a load of tries to work the Macbook and switch between people's presentations.

Other people presented on all sorts of things, from goat domestication, topologically associated domains and ancient hybridisation between different species of Homo (human) to gene drives, circular RNAs, and the genetic connection between people with Williams syndrome and dog behaviour. 

The talks were really good! Almost all of them were genuinely enjoyable, and because there was no pressure to commit them to memory I could just listen and let them spark ideas. I loved seeing each member of the class be so knowledgeable in their domain - I think that setup was a really good idea. People could get confidence and experience doing scientific presentations because it was something they knew intimately from the lit review, and the rest of us got to learn about something new. Because it was on one paper from the lit review, we all had a lot of background knowledge on our paper that helped with answering questions from the audience.

 I asked a question after most of the talks, to the point where people started coming up to me and asking me for nice questions as they passed me on the way to the stage. Sometimes I wouldn't ask a question and, because I apparently have some can't-shut-up disease, literally sat on my hands to make sure I wouldn't. The propensity for asking questions did come in handy when I had to do it as session chair, though all of a sudden I couldn't think of any due to pressure. 

Unexpectedly, I, jointly with Maya, won the Genetics prize for best presentation! I honestly was not expecting that at all, though I figured my presentation had gone grand. I think it was at least partly because my paper was just really cool and maybe my enthusiasm for it showed. Kieva won the one for Human Genetics students and I was really happy for her because her talk on topologically associated domains was great. 

Social
The Genetics department are fabulous and paid for us all to go down to Kippure Estate in Wicklow to do the presentations but also for all our meals, an open bar... I am so glad I picked Genetics as my moderatorship.

After the talks, we went for a two-hour dinner and then did a pub quiz followed by a singalong. I was the only one who brought an instrument (my ukulele) but some people in my class played the piano in the pub, and I played the hell out of the ukulele, as did Sarah when she borrowed it (she has an impressive voice). Ended up with a big blister but it was a great experience and has made me start playing the ukulele regularly again when I'd barely played it for about a year. Thank you to people including Aoise and Rachel who helped by scrolling through the chords to keep my hands free! It was so much fun. I talked a lot to Aoise and then we went back to one of the houses to party, which went on until 4 am. During that time I talked to a good few people and had a really nice time, alternating between chatting, personal talk, and science talk (had a random conversation about enhancers with Katie at about 3 am!) - it was really lovely. I was VERY tired the next day though, launching back into presentations at 9.30 am and then the start of the Laidlaw weekend (coincidentally in the same place)! 

Basically, the trip was great, and I love my class and the Genetics department. 💖