Marieline Amaya: Week 1 & 2 at ABDL SCDHS
The first two weeks here at the Arthropod-Borne Disease Laboratory with Suffolk County Department of Health Services have been very exciting! In the first week, we toured the lab and met entomologists, fellows, and others we will be working with this summer. I was able to learn a lot about the different tick species, the 4 of which are of medical importance here on Long Island. We even got to look at different mosquito species under the microscope as an aid to our training. Later in our first week, we got to go out into one of the lab’s core sites, a county park near the lab, where we got to collect ticks through a tick flagging method. Although difficult at first to spot the nymphs, I felt I got used to them after a while. It was very exciting to be out in the field; it was something I had never gotten to do before! After going out into the field, we spent some time sorting ticks from another site, and we got to see the different tick species of Amblyomma americanum, Ixodes scapularis, Dermacentor variabilis, and Haemaphysalis longicornis. We sorted both adults and nymphs!
Throughout week 1, we had also begun to brainstorm ideas for our projects and read through different literature on various topics concerning tick-borne diseases (TBDS). During week 2, we worked further on our projects by compiling information from literature. Additionally, in week 2, we attended a symposium on TBDS. There were different lectures on various aspects of TBDS. I even got to hear from people whose previous research on TBDs I had read just last week! This week we had also gone out to another site and collected ticks through flagging! It was very nice to be out in the field again this week. We got to collect more ticks as the weather was much better for collecting as our first week the weather was overcast. This time I even saw ticks actively questing on tall grass! Throughout the rest of the week we go to continue our projects and work on sorting ticks! Next week we will be going to more field sites, so I am very excited!
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