TRIP into a Whole New World by Shawnette James

Hi again! I can’t believe that TRIP has ended. It has been a great experience learning from Dr. Leystra and Ms. Pellegrin, and learning about my classmates and their projects. I never thought that in such a short period of time I would have completed such a project.

For my independent project, I wanted to see if caffeine and/or melatonin would affect the energy levels of flies, and then if they would affect the energy levels of sleep deprived flies. I based the dosage of caffeine and melatonin off of the recommended doses for humans, and I deprived my flies of sleep by placing them under a lamp, making sure they were not exposed to darkness. In order to test their energy levels, I used the Negative Geotaxis Assay. This assay tracks the energy levels of flies by tracking the distance that they travel in an empty vial. In order to perform this assay, you place flies in an empty vial marked from zero to eight centimeters, tap the vial onto a table three times, and then record the distances traveled after three seconds. 

After replicating my experiment four times, I found that caffeine had the greatest effect on the energy levels of the flies. This was expected, as we know that caffeine gives humans an energy boost. What I found especially interesting was that the flies that were fed caffeine in their food and deprived of sleep had higher energy levels than those that were well rested and had caffeine.

I really enjoyed TRIP because it allowed me to conduct research on something that I was interested in. I think research is pretty cool, but when you combine it with a topic that relates to you or that you’re really passionate about, I believe that it can be really rewarding.  ​