This last week I was in Berkeley California at the Phenix developer’s workshop. Phenix is a software package whose goal it is to advance the automation of macromolecular structure determination. The workshop was held on the grounds of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, situated on the hillside right above the campus of UC Berkeley. I liked the area a lot. As I showed in my last post, the lab has its own resident turkeys. Further, black-tailed deer can be seen further up the hill. The mornings were awesome, they reminded me of mornings in Utah. I think it is because there was a large hill immediately to the east, thus the direct-sunlight wasn’t seen until later in the morning.
While at the workshop I had the opportunity to work with lots of cool people. I truly enjoyed working with my Phenix friends. My PI had a great idea for a research project that I could tackle to be part of my dissertation project. While there I told a colleague about the project and he suggested a way in which I might accomplish the project, he even had code that advanced my project by several steps! However, this has mad me keenly aware of the fact that I have a ton to learn!! It is good though as this gives me direction whereas before I feel I was lacking a clear direction.
The fight home was my first red-eye. Its very difficult to fly east with the time change. Anyway, we left San Francisco at midnight, Pacific Time, and landed in Durham around 9:30 AM, Eastern Time. I find it hard to sleep in a bed let alone on an airplane. Needless to say, I did not sleep on the plane, one of only a handful on the flight. By the time I got home I was, surprisingly, wide-awake. I didn’t go to bed until 11PM that night making 39 consecutive hours without sleep, a new record for me!
Anyway, it was a great trip and I am looking forward to the next Phenix workshop this fall here at Duke.
