The NIGINTERN2024 program gave me the opportunity to have international study experience. This experience improved me on professional and personal levels.

This program is special for me due to its diversity. Students from all over the world participate in this program, and it forms an international consortium for scientific discussion. I enjoyed the weekly journal clubs and seminars where professors and seniors discuss scientific papers and research work.

In particular, I have had the opportunity to work in the Plant Cytogenetics Lab, where all the lab members are very enthusiastic about exploring the molecular mechanism of rice plant development. From this lab, I gained knowledge about plant stem development and pollen meiosis research. I also learned about teamwork, how to design experiments, and how to retrieve useful information by reading papers.

I performed an interesting experiment (Split luciferase complementation assay) with Prof. Tsuda. One part of this experiment, the infiltration method where I injected samples into tobacco plant leaves, was very exciting to me. During the experiments, we failed two times but got the result on the third attempt. Then, I repeated the experiments three times to have reliable data. It is fun to work and learn new things in this lab. Before the presentation, I gave mock seminar several times in the lab, which gave me confidence. I am grateful to Prof. Nonomura, Prof. Tsuda, and Huong-san for their suggestions throughout the internship. I am fortunate to be a part of Nonomura Lab, where people are very helpful.

I feel lucky to have nice intern friends. I spent memorable moments with my friends on the tour of Mt. Fuji, Lake Kawaguchi, Tokyo, Rakujuen Park, and around the beautiful city of Mishima.

Overall, my internship at NIG is remarkable. I am thankful to NIG for travel expenses and accommodation.