Oh it was bizarre but at least part of it worked so I got to go home early. So I'm using a newer cell type to measure something called TER...we kind of zap the cells and look at electrical resistance of the monolayer of cells this tells us how easily ions can move past the sides of the cells and this relates to water movement and thus diarrhea. Anyway I was testing two lines of controls with our bacterial infection. All the data I have so far suggests that expressing extra copies of a certain magic protein protects these gates on the side of the cell that are called tight junctions which should in theory prevent diarrhea...well what I did today suggests that even though the gates are structurally intact they are wide open letting all the ions pass freely just like they weren't there at all. These supposedly protective cells are actually worse than a normal cell. So the data is entirely opposite what I expected this is only the first experiment though so we have to do it a couple of times more to ensure its a real pattern.

Anyway the reason I thought it would take so long is the bacteria normally cause a decrease in TER by 4 hours but the last time I tried this experiment it didn't decrease even by 6 hours so I read about this cell line and some people follow it out 10 hours but it takes another 4 hours to grow and prep the bacteria. Turns out all I needed was a higher dose of bacteria and they responded well but the cells also had to be at least two weeks old. Anyway by about 2 hours post infection I was already seeing a decrease so I knew that even though the experiment was not what I expected (hint it never is...seriously) I still got to go home before 9pm so that was a big plus