Community Academy
Jamaica Plain in Boston, MA
April 27, 2023
BioBus's mobile laboratory spent the day working with high school students at Community Academy. We rolled up right into the parking lot in the sun, solar panels collecting rays to power the microscopy lab inside.
Students came aboard in groups of around 15. They got an introduction from me, Li, a community scientist, to some of the BioBus' systems and tools at hand for the day.
One of the most powerful tools aboard the BioBus is our donated Zeiss compound microscope equipped with a camera that links the image up to the jumbo screen.
Sneha Ganguly, one of the CME educators, was visiting for the day and jumped into discussions with students about the baby bella (Agaricus bisporus) mushrooms brought aboard that were going bad in Li's fridge. As an aside, did you know that baby bella, cremini, and portobello... all the same species, just different ages! An Eater article with this revelation and additional consumer mushroom facts.
Gilled mushroom anatomy diagram for those of you interested!
One talking point around mushrooms is their edibility, (also their toxicity and of course the ways humans have found medicinal uses of certain mushrooms - a fact that definitely came up with HS students). Focusing in on the fact that mushrooms are more nutritious when cooked let us talk about their unique chitinous makeup. Here is an article from Nature that details some how researchers are putting mushrooms in the hot seat (or rather, hot pot) learning more about the wild material properties of mushrooms -- their chitinous cell walls don't fully break down even when boiled in water at temperatures over 200 degrees!
Because we talked about chitin and mushroom's unique makeup, a student decided to investigate the fruiting body cellular structure further and used tools she found around the lab to make a small thin section of the mushroom cap.
She resourcefully used a cover slip and plastic tweezers to do the cutting, dextrous even using latex gloves.
Mounting the slide on the compound, we all took a step back to look at how the section turned out.
Lots of discussion ensued and rejoicing in the high quality of the section on the student's first try!
"I think I'll be a scientist." ... "You already are!"
Stunning looks on a 40x objective!
This activity came from the voice and direction of the student. She learned first the general preparation of a slide for a compound microscope, took stock of samples at hand, and then investigated further some of the concepts discussed by Sneha about the chitinous structure of the mushroom.
I found a resource online after that might have provided some more structure in the post-identification of microscopic structures in the section taken and had more detailed schematic instructions for sectioning.
Which structures from the guide below do you think you see pictured in the student's section? Comment below!
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