[Roselle]: I'm having a lot of fun here,
I have never had so much fun on another job before.
Hi, I'm Roselle.
I'm a biochemist for Gatorade Sports Science Institute,
and this is our biochemistry lab.
I decided to become a biochemist because when I
was younger I'd always been interested in math and science.
As I grew up my passion went into wanting to help
people or care for people.
So being a biochemist for Gatorade kind of combined
both of those passions.
[Narrator]: Biochemists like Roselle provide valuable
assistance to the research scientists at Gatorade,
who study how the human body fuels and cools itself.
[Roselle]: I always knew in science there were research jobs
in colleges and hospitals but I didn't know that
we could actually be here helping athletes and for a
company that's amazing - and the teamwork here is amazing too.
So that's kind of what made me want to work here.
Actually making a difference.
And not just a small scale but it's all over the world.
[Narrator]: Roselle collects samples of body fluids
like blood and sweat from athletes during
their various performance trials,
and analyzes them to determine how certain
ingredients in the test products are perfmorning in the body.
[Roselle]: So Beth gives me the sweat patches that are connected
to the sticky patch and I would separate it and put
it into the centrifuge tube and the cotton will
stay up here, and I'll spin it down extremely
fast so that the sweat just drips into this
chamber here, so that we have a clean sample that
we can test for sodium, potassium,
chloride‚ all your electrolytes‚ that can
help us see the level of hydration of the subject.
I have worked with a lot of famous sweat, and saliva.
We work with a lot of professional teams and
tri-athletes and marathon runners.
Basketball, football, soccer,
tennis, and golf. The golf one I'm sure you guys know.
When I'm not at work or at school I like to work
out at the gym, either on the elliptical or on the treadmill.
As a biochemist some of the interesting things
that I've learned is that your body tells you a
lot of different things, you may not even realize it.
Your saliva can tell you your hormone levels,
your sweat, it's just interesting how you can
know how fast your stomach empties or how fast your
intestines absorb just from a droplet of fluid
that we pull from your stomach and so I find that
extremely interesting that science has gotten so far
as to be able to tell us what our bodies are trying to tell us.
[Narrator]: While she looks at how exercise and hydration
affect athletic performance,
Roselle has her eyes set on being an athlete herself.
[Roselle]: I also like to run outside as much as I can. It helps
me train for my next goal the 10K and then a half
marathon and my ultimate goal is a triathlon by the end of summer.
So we just took the capillary tube
out of this centrifuge and the red blood cells are
packed all the way down to the bottom.
And what's left up top is the serum or the fluid
and this can let us know how hydrated the athlete is.
The more serum or more fluid there is, the more hydrated the athlete is.
This can help us determine whether or not he's
ready to go through the rigorous process of the trial.
So now I'm going to measure it with the
microscope and you guys will be surprised to know
you guys will actually use this after high school.
No job is perfect; some of the hurdles that I do face
are that I'm still kind of new to the field so
I'm learning a lot from everybody.
The good thing is that there's always someone
here to help me out.
I still feel like I'm treading on new territory
but the more I learn, the more engaged I am in
wanting to know more.
The most rewarding part is being able to do something
that I think definitely benefits the public.
I didn't want to do something just for making a living.
I wanted to be involved and think about it when
I'm off work and just put my whole heart into it.
In college, because I have a biology degree I
had to take advanced courses in science and
that included anatomy, and physiology and biochemistry.
And all of that lab work, all the resources that I
learned from there helped incorporate the knowledge
that I need to do my job here.
[Narrator]: Roselle is continuing her education
to further her career in science and medicine.
[Roselle]: Science used to be a male dominated field,
but I believe that there are more women that are
coming into this field now,
because there are a lot more doors open.
When I was growing up I never felt discouraged to
go into any field.
I had a lot of support from my family and
my teachers and there where a lot of resources available for me.
So I think that people are realizing that there are
no boundaries for girls growing up today.
It they want to become a scientist,
if they want to become a doctor or anything like
that they are more than welcome to and they're
definitely able to attain those goals.
Hello. Sure I have that data here.
You can definitely make a good living doing this type of work.
When I first started working here I bought my first car.
You can always advance with this kind of career.
There's never a threshold that you meet
that you can't branch off into doing something
else or get an advance degree,
and make a living off of that.
[Narrator]: Roselle loves her work,
but she keeps it all in persepective.
[Roselle]: I have been involved in some of the volunteer
programs in the Chicago schools.
I also like to play the piano and bake. Both of
those help me relax, kind of unwind,
and just, I think that's it.
Scientists make a difference because they're always inventing
something, discovering something.
Without scientists looking at new avenues of where we
could go we would be stuck.
Science is definitely cool I can't imagine being in
any other field that's not as exciting as this.
Honestly there's just so much new research coming
out every day in the news and journals and it's
just so exciting to be a part of that.