I'm a postdoctoral fellow in Steve Block's lab at Stanford (he of the famous cappuccino machine) where I have been working on developing combined optical trapping and single molecule FRET, and using that to study ribozyme structure and function. My graduate work was done at UIUC in Paul Selvin's lab, mostly doing single molecule fluorescence (although we did do a bit of FRAP and confocal microscopy back when I was starting.) As the title of the blog suggests, I'm pretty interested in single molecule biophysics.
At the BPS on Saturday, I'll be attending the fluorescence subgroup (always a reliable gathering of UIUC alumni, and in particular people who studied under Enrico Gratton and/or Gregorio Weber), as well as sticking my head in the door at the motility subgroup. I don't do any work on motility personally, but just about everybody I've ever worked with does, so you kind of get exposed to it by proxy.
During the meeting proper, I'll probably be attending mostly the platforms on RNA, fluorescence techniques, and force spectroscopy. But I do occasionally like to show up to random talks that I don't know anything about, and see if I can learn something. Unfortunately, given Sturgeon's Law, these talks usually don't teach me much, and I wind up falling asleep.
The other thing I will be doing a lot of is drinking. I find that conferences in general are about 50% science, and 50% schmoozing, and the schmoozing almost always takes place over drinks. To that end, I will have friends in town, and I am going to make an effort to go out on Saturday night. If all goes as planned, I'm probably going to hit the lounge at the W Hotel near the convention center and catch up with old friends and new. Feel free to stop by!
P.S. I'm also currently looking for jobs! See the link on the right for my CV!
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