1. Can you please briefly summarize this paper and your work?
Can you please tell us the main difficulties you had in the laboratory work and how you overcame them?

To generate knockout mice, 129 strain-derived ES cells are widely used because they are easy to culture and handle. Many fields of biology, however, prefer the use of C57BL/6 strain on various reasons. Although C57BL/6 ES cells have been available over decades, they were believed to be too inefficient to create knockout mice successfully. In creating a knockout mouse for my own thesis project, I wanted to make it using C57BL/6 ES cells to compare with other mutant strains on the same genetic background. Because there was no data available on how 'inefficient' C57BL/6 ES cells are, we decided to make our knockout mouse using both C57BL/6 and129 ES cells. In this ES cell comparison study, it turned out that C57BL/6 ES cells are not that bad to work with. Moreover, in later steps of knocking-out process, they have certain advantages over 129 ES cells.

2. Please introduce your laboratory, university or organization to bio-researchers in Korea.

University of Michigan has a large medical school with various departments. It has many useful services and cores to facilitate biomedical research in campus. For example, we collaborated with Transgenic Core of University of Michigan to compare these two ES cells and to create our knockout mouse.

3. Can you provide some advice for younger scientists who have plans to study abroad?

My advisor Dr. Burmeister not only guides me in doing science itself but also shares with me how the American system works in doing science including setting up collaboration, applying for grants, submitting papers, reviewing others' papers and grants. I enjoyed a lot learning this cultural aspect of science. I believe when our Korean way of thinking is exposed to other cultures, it becomes more creative and efficient. So, please be prepared to open yourself to a new culture.