Hello World!

If there's a more overused programming bit (no pun intended) I don't know it. I just wanted to take a minute to share with you all what I'm hoping to do with this space. But first, a big shout out to Brian and the rest of the LabSpaces crew for having me- I'm really excited to be a part of this community!

A little about me: I'm a PhD candidate at the College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering in the University at Albany, part of the State University of New York. My lab is part of the Nanobiosciences Constellation (we don't like to call them "departments".) It might sound like a lot of marketing and buzzwords, but it is actually really exciting to be working "at the bottom" like Feynman described more than 50 years ago. I was originally trained as a physicist but when I realized and grasped that in the nanoelectronics arena we're making things SMALLER than human cells, I knew I needed to make a switch and apply these techniques to biological problems.

So, what I hope to bring to this blog, the LabSpaces community, and the blogosphere, is the intersection of nanotechnology and biotechnology. I wrote a guest post here a few weeks ago on how to prepare for and deliver a "big" presentation. It was a lot of fun, and I had a similar post in the hopper on getting the most out of your PhD, but I really want this to be about the science and engeering at the nanoscale. The posts on graduate school life, and professional skills, or things outside of this nanobio scope will stay on my blog For Love of Sciences. In addition, I plan to keep blogging once a month at BenchFly with my column "Sensational Science".

Again, thanks for checking me out and stay tuned! Oh, and let me leave you with one of my favorite physics/biology quotes:

At that time some physicists were not very sympathetic with us because we wanted to solve a biological truth by physical means. But fortunately some physicists thought that through using the techniques of physics and chemistry a real contribution to biology could be made. The wisdom of these men in encouraging us was tremendously important in our success. Professor Bragg, our director at the Cavendish and Professor Niels Bohr often expressed their belief that physics would be a help in biology. The fact that these great men believed in this approach made it much easier for us to go forward.