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Posts tagged as “science”

(Archive April 2016) Profiling: Heather Conn

By editorialteam on August 27, 2024

Making Science Fun

By Andrew Hoenig | Assistant Editor

Photo courtesy of Heather Conn

Gardner, Mass. – Professor of Sciences Heather Conn is looking to make learning science fun for students at Mount Wachusett Community College by bringing a young and energetic teaching style.

Conn, 43, has been a professor at the Mount for almost 11 years teaching a wide variety of sciences on campus including Anatomy I and II, Physiology I and II, Environmental Chemistry, Life Sciences for Allied Health, Geology, and Paleontology.

“I like being a jack of all trades,” said Conn.  read more

(Archive February 3, 2009) Beyond the Beaker

By editorialteam on July 10, 2024

Science Column by Lindsey Washburn

My Sea Monkeys!

I get to have pets this semester in Biotech 120! Well … not really pets. They’re CHOs, Chinese Hamster Ovary cells, carrying a gene of interest. Our gene of interest is just a marker, so that we know the experiment was successful. In the real world CHOs are used to make proteins too complex to be made by bacteria.

Insulin, for example, can be grown in bacteria, and has been for years. But the transmembrane protein that is missing in cases of Cystic Fibrosis cannot. For such a complex, fancy-schmancy protein as the chloride channel, a more complex vector is needed. read more

From Alaska to the Mount

By editorialteam on October 6, 2022

Meet MWCC’s New Chemistry Professor, John Sirois

By Maddie Willigar | Editor-in-Chief

Dr. John Sirois

Assistant Chemistry Professor, Dr. John Sirois, has just begun his first semester at Mount Wachusett Community College after moving back from Alaska, where he taught the past five years.

            Originally from Massachusetts, Sirois moved away from home after completing his master’s degree. From here, he continued his education at the University of Rhode Island (URI), where he obtained his Ph.D., and Oregon State University (OSU), where he completed his post-doctoral fellowship. read more