Hi
I’m in my first year of PhD. My research is regarding culturing of Leishmania donovani parasites and testing the efficacy of plant extract for its anti leishmanial activities. I am facing a lot of problems in culturing the parasite. As I am the only research scholar under my guide, I am really frustrated as I have to manage everything. From ordering new chemicals to maintenance of the lab, propagation of cells and now the parasites. Apart from this, I have to take out time for study as well as study for my research. My guide also asks me to help him with presentations regarding the classes he needs to take. Amidst so much workload and stress, it is my practical work that is suffering. I am unable to devote sufficient time to my wet lab practices. I am finding it extremely difficult to maintain the cell lines and parasite cultures. My passages are not successful. Either there is some fungal infection or the cells die (due to some reason that I am unable to fathom). This is further irritating my guide, as he is losing faith in me. I am unable to manage the cell lines and it also a huge financial burden. (the cells are costly to procure. Further the instruments and equipments required for handling them are costly and need to be discarded after a single use. So my resources are getting wasted too). Kindly help me with some advice on successful culturing cell lines and parasites as would be help me a lot.