【海外インターンシップ／トゥルク】報告
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Post-event Reports
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2015.9.14 |
2015年9月6日（日）から10月4日（日）の期間、3期生のCarman Ka Man Tseさんが、フィンランドにあるトゥルク大学で海外インターンシップを行っております。
以下、Carmanさんからの報告です。
2015年9月13日／No.1
Here is my first weekly report for my internship in Finland. During this 4-week internship, I will be working in Professor Arno laboratory and doing some research about the gut immune system in type 1 diabetes.（中略 研究内容）I am very glad to be accepted as a summer student here and I am sure that I will be benefited a lot from my brief stay in Turku.
Professor Arno and the other lab members seem quite enjoy the souvenirs I brought from Japan and Macau, especially the sesame peanut brittle, because they barely have peanuts or peanut products at all; and I think this is more to do with the food culture difference between Finland and other Asian countries. Surprisingly enough there is also a noticeable difference in lunch culture of Finland versus what I was used to in Japan. Finnish people tend to favor large, heavy lunches and many of them tend to be all-you-can-eat buffet style cafeterias. Depending on the day, you might find potatoes, salmon, stew and even fish soup in the menu and it is fascinating to know that there have more than 10 ways in cooking potatoes and baking breads (which is nice because I am a big fan of them!). I also noticed that everyone here tends to go out for lunch, definitely not the same with the Japanese "bento" culture. People in Finland are really friendly so one can easily get used to the environment very easily.
Sincerely, Carman
2015年9月20日／No.2
My second week as an intern in University of Turku was a blast. First of all, I was informed that one of my lab mate is getting married at a church next week. She has been very busy with experiments and wedding preparations for the past few weeks so I am very glad to see her finally getting everything done and being ready to be a beautiful bride. Secondly, I found a nice cafeteria close to my building that offered reasonable lunch buffet and I am pretty sure I will look healthier after I return to Japan thanks to the high nutrient diet I have here.
I am working under a postdoctoral researcher in Professor Arno lab. Raine is a kind and very patient person and I learned a lot of "tips" in performing experiments and analyzing experimental data.（中略 研究内容）These experiments will not occupy much of my time so I am going to ask Professor Arno if it is possible to get me involved in other different projects.
I am new in town here in Finland so Professor Arno kindly took me around the city someday last week after work. He became my one-day guide and showed me the main attractions in Turku, such as the Turku Cathedral (see attached photos), Turku Castle, Pharmacy Museum, port of Turku, and the River Aura. During the summer, the river comes to life when people (especially students) gather here to eat, drink, read and listen to music. Thus it will be a lovely idea to spend an afternoon sitting in the sunshine reading some books, such as the Harry Potter series. There were some old sailing ships moored in the river so it is not difficult to find a restaurant with nice view there. He also invited me to his house and enjoy the traditional Finnish dinner and sauna with his family, what a lovely suggestion! I am very much looking forward to next week!
Sincerely yours, Carman
2015年9月27日／No.3
My third week as an intern in Turku is coming to a close. This week started out with loads of fun. First of all, we held a farewell party for one of the hospital technicians who is retiring this month. Although the official retirement age in Finland is 60-65 years old, more Finns are working beyond 65 because many of they enjoy working and therefore consider themselves being too young to stay in retirement. However, it is not easy to tell one´s age by his/her face because people from Finland usually have light blond hair and very nice skin even thoughthey are aged(!). Secondly, one new master student has joined the Arno group so we have more people during the lab meeting. She is a nice and very ambitious person and I enjoy talking to her very much because she always have some interesting stories to share.
This week was started with another round of CFSE staining and FACS analysis.（中略 研究内容）
Sauna, as you may know, is a substantial part of Finnish culture, and is a must-do-session on Friday evening. So yesterday, professor Arno kindly invited me to his house and enjoy their home-made wood burning sauna. Finns like sauna so much that they have to visit it at regular intervals, and if they go too long without sauna, they will start feeling incomplete. After the sauna, we started to prepare dinner together: we cooked a piece of big salmon on a barbecue grill, boiled some potatoes and vegetables for starters, and did some side-dishes. His family has a lot of funny topics and interesting stories to share so it is not easy to get bored around the table. It is indeed a very nice experience in Finland and I will never forget such a wonderful night.
Sincerely yours, Carman
2015年10月4日／No.4
Here comes the last post for my internship in Finland.
This week was started with some routine RT-qPCR work.（中略 研究内容）
Besides the experimental work, I also participated the BioNet seminar organized by the University of Turku. Normally, the invited presenters are from some sort of European countries like Finland, Sweden or Spain, but this time, they got a special guest from Japan who happened to be an old friend of Arno’s, Professor Miyasaka. He gave an impressive talk on lymphocyte trafficking and provided a lot of meaningful data to support his hypothesis on how lysophospholipids such as locally produced LPA act as signals to direct leukocyte extravasation. After his talk in the morning, there was a presentation meeting in the afternoon where students of the GE/turku group got a chance to present the research we had been doing in Japan. Professor Miyasaka kindly invented four more students (Japanese & Finns?) from the university and we had a very brain-storming discussion in the afternoon. Especially I was impressed Dr. Takeda’s two-photon microscopic result which demonstrated the dendritic cells trafficking. It was a nice opportunity to exchange ideas and opinions and I have got some advice and suggestions for my future work.
I took a day-off on Friday and went to Helsinki for "kenshyu" with students in the GE/turku group, with Professor Miyasaka being our leader. We visited the studio and house of a Finnish designer, Alvar Aalto, who is well-known throughout the world of modern architecture and design. We also visited the Helsinki Cathedral and were planing to take a ferry at the Port of Helsinki. However, due to our tight time schedule we couldn’t make time for the ferry, so the ferry visit will be added in our future to-do-list when we visit Finland in our future.
Time flies so fast and I can’t believe it has been four weeks already. I enjoyed this internship very much not only because I could learn how to conduct experiment in a laboratory not traditionally exposed to my field, but also because I could experience the Scandinavia culture (e.g. how they manage to take care their family while being productive in academia). The experience was highly stimulating and inspirational, and I would never trade it for other practical lab experience if I could.
I have included two pictures. One is picture of the laboratory, taken on the last day of my stay. Starting from the left is the new comer Emily, and my supervisor Raine, where Professor Arno was directly standing next to me wearing a shirt. The other is a boat restaurant across river.
Sincerely, Carman
