Week 2 in Brazil (Jonathon's Update)

This week was spent working on our DNA sequencing project and getting to know Salvador more.

Science: We started the week isolating DNA from the sponge samples we collected. Unfortunately, the technique we used fragmented the DNA, so we did not get the results we were looking for. We finished the week extracting new DNA using a different approach that we hope will get us longer pieces of DNA to sequence. I also worked this week with one of my awesome graduate students, Jouber Calixto, setting up the bioinformatics course I will teach starting tomorrow. I really hope it goes well, and we can help these students learn valuable skills.

Salvador: I have gotten to try many different types of food. They have a restaurant with a Brazillian Buffet. They have different foods every day. It is fun to try a bunch of different ingredients and flavors.

On Friday, I went to register with the Federal Police. However, they found my old mission visa, and my parents middle names were spelled out, while my new visa had their middle initials. They are making me work with the state department to get my visa edited so they match. The good news is my old visa had my CPF number (like a Brazilian SSN), so I can more easily pay for things now. We spent so long trying to recover it but eventually gave up, and now I have it. I also got a better picture of the temple being built here on my way to the immigration office.

On Saturday, Emilio Lanna and his wife took me to see the historic part of town. We ate lunch in a colonial-era building that houses a school to teach chefs how to cook traditional food from this area. We also walked the streets and saw a baroque chapel with a very ornate chapel and classic Portuguese blue tile (azulejo) murals (you can see them in the background of the courtyard).

I am enjoying my time here, but I look forward to my family joining me in a few weeks! It was hard today being away from my wife and my mom on Mother's Day (it is also Mother's Day here), but I should see both of them in Rio soon!