Biology to me is like a faucet that leaks and creates ripples in a pool. When I first learn that DNA has a sequence that is important to something on a molecular level I understand it on that level. Next I can look at how cells multiply and relate the DNA’s sequence to it’s self replication. This is important to how the tissue that DNA came from is created and how it functions, which is dependent on how...

Charles Fayal Pea Plants! The work that had the most impact on me is a paper written by a monk. “Versuche uber Pflanzehybriden” by Gregor Mendel. I learned how a man made observations that have changed the study of biology. He looked at patterns in pea plant flowers. Pea plants! He then calculated and described “genetics” mathematically. Actually, he invented a new branch of biology. Biology is like a pool. A single drop ripples through the surface and transforms every...

Charles Fayal Misfortunes are Fortunate “Johns Hopkins is a second tier school!”. This may have only been said once in all of history, possibly twice, truthfully I can’t remember how many times my mother belittled my siblings schools. She came from the hoods of Philadelphia and worked herself into both Harvard and Dartmouth, so my siblings and I had quite the quota to fill. However, I always felt like she had a motivation that I never had. She was...

I honestly wish I took more...

UConn is becoming a huge research and STEM (science,...