Arts & Sciences

My trip to London this week coincided with a thick blanket of fog that covered southern part of the country for most of the week. It was a pretty amazing thing to witness. When we landed, we descended into the clouds, and the next thing we knew it, were on the ground. There visibility was non-existent, and it took us about an hour to get to the gate. This caused major delays at the airport, surprisingly not because it affected takeoffs or landings, but because planes couldn’t see where they were going on the taxiways. All this caused the airport to cancel most domestic and European flights, causing major headaches before the Christmas travel season. Maybe I’m bad luck: last time I visited London, there was a strike at the airport.

Aside from the weather, the trip had a couple highlights. I got in a pre-dawn run through Chelsea to the banks of the Thames. “Pre-dawn” sounds more ambitious than it really was, since the sun came up at 8AM this time of year. Still, the streets were empty, and the streetlights were on, which made for a fun atmosphere to explore the city. We also enjoyed a nice dinner at Le Suquet, a French seafood place. I had a smoky bouillabaisse and an entree of scallops in wine sauce.

Today was the sign-up for the Covered Bridges Half Marathon, my favorite race. This year all 2,000 spots in the race sold out in just three hours! I’m really glad I was able to get a spot, and am looking forward to running it for my fifth time this June.

Today I went to the Hi-Rise bakery in Cambridge Square for lunch. It was packed, and the line was almost out the door. I was really craving an Il Presidente, so I decided to stay and wait it out. I took my place in line behind an guy in a trench coat, who was working – reviewing a document – as he stood in line.

The guy looked vaguely familiar. I did some shoulder surfing, and saw that he was reviewing some sort of scientific proposal. (I didn’t have my glasses, but saw that two of the headings were about target validation and high-throughput screening.) Then, when he placing his order, he gave his name as “Eric.”

I knew he was vaguely familiar – it was Eric Lander! And I thought I was busy…

This most recent Economist Technology Quarterly has a article on the history of DNA microarrays, or “DNA Chips”. The article recounts their early development at Oxford, Affymax, and Stanford and describes some of the technology’s pioneering applications, like discovering subtypes of cancer, and enabling new types of medical diagnostics.