Cambridge and London Day 1

This week I have been in England for a developer's workshop and some fun in London. The first part of the week I was up in Cambridge working hard at the semi-annual Phenix developer's workshop. The first impressions of Great Britain : the full English breakfast is great, driving on the lef-hand side of the road is strange, and everyone rides a bike... AWESOME!

The real story from Cambridge is the food, the rest of it was 'boring' scientific software programming. We stayed at a bed and breakfast where I took advantage of the full English breakfast each morning. The dinners were pretty awesome too. The first night we went to a Turkish restaurant with plenty of yummy kabobs. The Second night we went to an Indian restaurant, very good food! But I didn't enjoy it because there was coriander in my dish, as such that was all I tasted...yuk!! The third night we had dinner in old Cambridge library in Sidney Sussex College, which is where Oliver Cromwell's head is buried. (The Royalist dug up his corpse and beheaded him after they re-took power.) We had a very fancy dinner there consisting of duck and potatoes. The final night in Cambridge we went to a local restaurant, The Backstreet Bistro, where I had a very good Pimm's lamb.

Yesterday we took the train to London where my lab mates and I went out for Tapas. This was by far the best dinner of the entire trip! This was real Tapas. We tried about eight different dishes and they were all of excellent quality. My favorite dishes were TXIGORKI and PIMIENTOS DE PADRÓN, look it up. So next time you are going by King's Cross Station be sure to hit up Camino! After that I went my  own way leaving my lab mates to fly back to the States. I found a place to stay with some local members of the Mormon church.

So today I spent time at the Tower of London and Regent's Park. The majority of the day was spent at the Tower, I got there at 9 and left at 3. It was awesome! I then spent the rest of the day at the gorgeous Regent's Park. I'll let the pictures tell the story. Sorry that some are not straight, I took most of the pictures ;).

Going into the Tower grounds, looking at the outer wall. The grassy area was the moat.

Just inside the inner wall looking at Wakefield Tower.

Waterloo lock, where they keep the Crown Jewels. Also, where the olympic medals were for safe keeping.

The White Tower.

Me in fron of the White Tower.

Tutor buildings east of the White Tower

Me in front of Tower Bridge.

Regent's Park

Regent's Park

Me at Regent's Park

PHENIX: Santa Fe

Every six months I attend a Phenix developers workshop. Phenix is a software package for structure determination via xray crystallography. My lab is mainly concerned with the validation step (there are many steps in structure determination). This spring the workshop was held in Santa Fe, NM.  We stayed in an old hotel, La Fonda, in the heart of the city (the building on the right-hand side of the picture is La Fonda).

We arrived late Sunday evening. The format of the workshop is pretty free, meaning that the developers work on their projects like any other day. The difference here is that all the developers are together in one room. This is very advantageous as the developers can collaborate face-to-face, which is infinitely more effective, and thus more productive, than long-distance communication. There is also a day of talks and an industry roundtable discussion. During the day of talks various developers give presentations on new features they have incorporated into the Phenix package. This essentially puts all developers on the same page. The industry roundtable discussion allows people from industry (think of a structural biologist at a drug company) to have input on what they would like to see developed. These workshops are very productive and also leaves the developers with new ideas and a lot more work!

I've been to three of the four workshop locations, which rotates among the four different labs working on the project. I've been to Berkley, Santa Fe, and, of course, Duke; In September I'll be going to the final location in Cambridge, UK. So far Santa Fe is my favorite. Santa Fe is a cute small town with amazing shops and fun art galleries. I had ample time to walk around the city; what else was I going to do at 5:30 AM when everyone else was asleep? I love the pueblo architecture, the rich history, the food, the dry desert air, and just about everything else about Santa Fe. Here are a few pictures from my phone:

I bought a new bolo!!

Elk tenderloin on the last evening  (Coyote Cafe)

Banana-cream pie (Coyote Cafe)

Lawrence Berkley Labratory

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.

LBL

What, may you ask, is LBL? Well, I'm here to not only tell you but show you also. LBL stands for Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory. It is on the campus of the University of California, you know, the one in Berkeley. This happens to be where I am right now, for a collaboration workshop. This workshop, which is held every six months, rotates between here, Duke, and Cambridge. I may have more to say when all is said and done at the end of the week. Until then, enjoy these pictures I managed to get with my phone this morning.

Looking down onto the campus from LBL.

The LBL guest house.

Trees and the overcast sky.

Resident turkeys.

A resident.

A random building.

Look out on the bay.

Phenix and a New Car

So I’ve has been very busy this past week; it was spring break. For me, all that meant is that I had no classes; I still had to go into lab. We had a very special week in lab as we hosted the Phenix conference. Phenix is software used in crystallographic structure refinement. The Richardson lab, of which I’m a member, is one of the developers of Phenix. The exciting aspect of the conference for me was that my code, that I wrote as an undergraduate (and am still developing), might be incorporated into the Phenix package!

The conference was great! I met a lot of awesome people from all over the USA and a few from Europe. We had developers and industry people there. The industry people were from a variety of drug companies. There were two industry people that worked in Copenhagen. Both were from Norway but understood me when I sang Happy Birthday in Danish. The conference was a time to cash in on free meals. We went to a different restaurant each night and had a variety of lunches each day. It was very busy as the earliest I got home was 9:30 between Sunday and Wednesday.

For the last couple of weeks I have been shopping around the Internet for a car. Last Saturday I decided to go look at two cars at a used car lot in Raleigh. The first car had a strange sound emanating from the engine while the second car smelled HORRIBLE. My roommate, Jeremy, then led me to the near by Honda dealer. We mainly looked at 2007 Accord lease buybacks. The top choice was an Accord with 3,900 miles on it, which was put on the lot the night before. The car was owned by a 92 year-old woman who had her license revoked with a year left on the lease. I wanted it but was beat to the punch by a couple that was trying to qualify for financing. So there was a possibility that I could still get the car. I had to wait until Monday to hear whether the car was mine. After a long weekend I received a phone call indicating that the couple didn’t qualify. A few hours later I was driving home my new car (see below).

That’s all for this week. Enjoy the pictures.

As you can see, Grandma did some contact parking.

My room mates. Oh ya, me and my new car are in there too.