Check out this fantastic resource from the California Academy of Sciences for tips to create your very own science notebook. Science notebooks are a place for careful observations, accurate record keeping, and creativity. After setting up your notebook, use it to record your thoughts, observations, questions, and responses throughout trainee activities.

In your notebook, work through this Draw a Scientist Activity with a parent, teacher, or friend. Compare your drawings, how are they similar and how are they different? There is no one way that a scientist looks; science is for everyone. You are a scientist and a member of our team!

"As a brain scientist, I use bright bioluminescent tools that light up the brain to see what's happening inside. I start by picking a part of the brain that we don't know much about, for example, a small section near the back. I attach a special bioluminescent molecule to a part of a mouse's brain, and watch it glow. The brighter it glows, the more that brain area is helping the mouse think at that moment. For example, I might put the bioluminescent molecule in the back of the brain, near the top. Let’s say I then have the mouse watch TV. If the back of the brain is really dim and dark, it means the mouse is not using that part of the brain at the moment. If all of a sudden a zebra pops up on the TV, and the back-top of the brain gets REALLY BRIGHT, then we know the back-top part of the mouse brain helps the mouse think about zebras."

"Puzzles always interested me as a kid because I got to figure out how little pieces of a puzzle fit together to make a beautiful image appear. As a molecular biologist, I do the exact same thing! I figure out how I can make little pieces fit together to control things cells typically couldn’t do. Can we make a brain cell glow? Sure we can! With the right pieces fitting together you can definitely make brain cells glow.

"Making brain cells glow is just the beginning as it takes only one little piece: a luciferase. We are going to need to make different puzzle pieces if we want these brain cells to do more than just glow.

"My research is all about making pieces of a puzzle come together in different ways, painting a different picture every time. Each time, with every puzzle I solve by creating new pieces, I can make a brain cells do something they were never able to do before."

"I'm a current undergraduate student who is working on developing a database of all of the bioluminescent molecules scientists have identified and/or modified to be used in the field of brain science! The work that I'm doing right now mostly involves reading a lot of papers, and recording the names of molecules and the information that is important for scientists to know when using those molecules into a giant database of already over one hundred different molecules. While this database currently exists as a big spreadsheet, our future directions for this project are to program an interactive website that contains all of these molecules, and reach out to some of the scientists who are working on developing the most efficient versions of these molecules, so that we can make the information available to all scientists who could use bioluminescent molecules to contribute to the advancement of science!"