MHC fiber typing of my muscle cells

 

This is the silver stain assay that we use for determining MHC fiber type (fast-twitch, slow-twitch or hybrid of both).  Each lane was loaded with a single isolated muscle fiber (single cell) and each band represents the MHC protein that was present in each cell.  The top bands are the Type IIa (fast-twitch) MHC and the bottom bands are the Type I MHC.  If both bands are present, then the muscle fiber has a mixture of both types and is a hybrid.  What a nice clean assay to determine our results! 

These samples were taken from my own muscle of my very first biopsy last month, which I am isolating in the photo above.  The final lane that’s the super ugly smear is a mashed-up mixture of a standard mammalian cell culture from mutant green monkey cells that I worked with in grad school.  This is why working with REAL HUMAN TISSUE is so awesome- clean results can be determined that directly translate to REAL HUMAN FUNCTION and are not just inferred from studies on other species or mutant human immortalized cancer cells grown in culture for decades that have 82 chromosomes.  This is a big problem and limitation with much of the cancer research that goes on these days where the models used to study the disease do not properly reflect what goes on in real life.  We are incredibly lucky that we can study an IN VIVO HUMAN system at the SINGLE CELL LEVEL since muscle is so accessible, regenerative, non-invasive to biopsy and is composed of the largest cells in our bodies.  This is a big reason for why I am so excited about this research and decided to join this team!