The fungus Trametes versicolor can degrade Escherichia coli in water

My research journey began at the very end of my freshman year; I had never done scientific research before and started off by thinking about research topics that personally related to me. My first draft of a research idea involved comparing methods of treating swimming pools, but after doing more background research, I realized that it was already an extensively-studied topic.

During the summer before sophomore year, I began looking at recently published papers to see if there were ways I could expand upon them. Eventually, I found a paper discussing the use of fungi to remediate soil contaminated by lead. Reading that study was the first time I had heard of mycoremediation; I thought it was super interesting that such a dangerous contaminant could be cleaned up using something so common, and I decided to look into the topic more.

Of course, lead is nowhere near safe, so I needed to decide on a different contaminant to study. After looking into contaminants present in water, I noticed that Escherichia coli was a common occurrence. As I had heard of research projects involving the use of E. coli before, I decided to propose the idea to my research teachers, and it was approved. Woohoo!

The rest of my summer consisted of doing more background research on mycoremediation, annotating research articles, and writing annotated bibliographies. As part of my summer assignment, I also created a list of definitions of words associated with my research project. As I progressed with background research, I thought about ways I could test my research topic and looked into species of fungi I could use.

As I started my sophomore year, I had a pretty good idea of what my research topic would be. I began ordering materials, making adjustments to my topic and methods as needed. Along the way, I wrote my introduction and methods, revising them based on the feedback I got.

Experimentation was definitely not what I had expected it to be. My experiment took place in the laboratory of one of my high school’s chemistry classrooms, which I was familiar with, but I didn’t have much experience with lab work and had only ever conducted pre-made experiments in my science classes. One of the biggest struggles I faced during my experiment was time; I had chosen a method that would take over a month of experimentation, and my time troubles were only exacerbated by the fact that the fungus plates I had ordered were taking longer than expected to arrive. I owe a lot to my research teachers; they were always willing to come to school to supervise my research even while my school was in E-Learning, and they stayed with me in the lab when my experimentation took longer than expected.

One of my most vivid memories from my research is my experience writing my research paper; my experiment had taken more time than I had anticipated, and deadlines for midterms were coming up. I still remember the shock and horror I felt upon learning that I had to count my colonies, analyze my data, and finish writing my research paper all within the span of 4 days. I honestly think those 4 days are the hardest I have ever worked; as soon as I finished my chemistry final, I started counting colonies, staring at the tiny dots until my vision started blurring. Although I definitely struggled during those 4 days, I can genuinely say that the satisfaction I felt after finishing data analysis and writing my final paper was pretty amazing. I never thought that I’d say the words, “Let’s go, my p value is less than .001,” but here we are.

Still, I wasn’t done with my research journey yet. I continued my year by revising my paper, fixing small mistakes I hadn’t noticed before. I also created a presentation and a poster to help present the findings of my research. Soon, I began participating in research events and competitions, presenting at my school’s research symposium and competing in a regional science fair. Eventually, I presented my project at a competition held by SCJAS, the South Carolina Junior Academy of Science, and shortly after, I was given the opportunity to publish my research paper in the Journal of the South Carolina Academy of Science and to attend the 2022 AJAS meeting.

Although research was definitely a difficult process, it was super fulfilling, and I still feel really lucky to have had the opportunity to conduct independent research during the COVID pandemic. I learned a lot about the research process, various laboratory techniques, and data analysis, and I look forward to applying that knowledge later on in my academic career!