Larval lab meeting

Larval Ecology Lab Meeting at the microscopes. The bright
light is from one of the 'scope lights refracted through a
dish of seawater. 

There's a practice in academia that goes by a few names - journal club, lab meeting, or paper discussion. The basic concept is that a group of people who work on a similar topic get together once a week to read a published study in their field and talk about it. The group my lab participates in at WHOI is called Larval Ecology Lab Meeting. It's a great way to stay current on the literature, build relationships, and besides, it's quite fun. 

This week, Larval Ecology Lab Meeting had a special twist. The summer interns were in town for the in-person portion of the program, so we capitalized on the opportunity and looked at a plankton sample together in the lab! There are just certain things you just cannot do with a large group over Zoom, and sorting tiny swimming animals from a dish of water under a microscope is definitely one of them. 

Teamwork! Photo by Lauren Dykman

We took my hand net to Eel Pond to collect a sample and then settled down at the microscopes together. Looking at plankton under a microscope is one of my absolute favorite things, and it was incredibly fun to share the experience with new students. I was constantly called to one microscope and then the other to identify things - copepods, snail larvae, some random fragment of schumtz. 

I was actually hoping to have more microscopes set up for the crowd, but unfortunately, my boxes from the Arctic cruise are still not back in the country. I had brought two microscope heads back in my carry-on, but their metal bases were packed in a box and still underway. The solution? Teamwork! My colleague, Maria, stopped by the lab to see what was going on with the larvae and ended up loaning her arms to serve as my microscope stand. We grabbed an old lamp that looked like it had been in the lab since the 1950s, and voila! - functioning microscope. 

It felt so good to be back in the lab with colleagues and students sorting plankton!