For Northeastern University third-year cell and molecular biology major Pedro Graziosi, working in the laboratory at Dharma Bioscience in Mendoza, Argentina, presented a challenge.
Originally from Buenos Aires, he travels to Argentina twice a year for holidays and family visits. So he was familiar with the country.
What was eye-opening about his co-op work at a bioscience startup was learning how to conduct a variety of laboratory procedures and experiments and communicate scientific results, all in Spanish.
Learning science in Spanish
“I grew up learning Spanish through my grandparents and my friends,” Graziosi says.
But working at the lab was like learning a whole new language, he says. “It took some adjusting. They talk about chemical processes and biological (terms) that I’ve never heard of before because I’ve never studied biology in Spanish.”
Soon enough, Graziosi grew familiar with terms like colorantes fluorescentes, or fluorescent dyes, and citometria de flujo, Spanish for a flow cytometry lab test.
“It gave me a very, very extensive look into research and what it was like,” he says.
Read more at Northeastern Global News
Photo by Matthew Modoono, Northeastern University
