Gone Sailing

One of the events that took place during the "blackout" period (when I did not blog) is worth reporting.

Ayelet, the command center of our lab, has collected all her saved vacation days (and borrowed some from the future) to take a 6 month vacation. To be honest, she warned me about that plan when we first met to discuss her position as a lab manager. Ayelet's plan was to take a boat and sail with the family in the Mediterranean from Israel to Italy and back, visiting Cypres, Turkey, Greece, and Croatia on the way. Back then it seemed far away and beyond care.

When Ayelet told me they bought a boat, I realized that the plan might actually be carried out. I even got a chance to sail with Ayelet and Udi  one nice day out from Jaffa port (where they had a mooring point).

But since September the threat become more realistic. As the target date in April was closing in, Ayelet worked hard to make sure there are no loose ends left in the lab. She finished all the experiments she was performing, made sure our supply and daily operations are defined by a robust set of instructions. She left different lab members in charge of different aspects of the lab, and left strict instructions how to behave.

Surprisingly, we managed to avoid a major crisis so far. Things are working relatively smoothly, and we carry on the momentum Ayelet left us. This does not mean she will not have a lot of work when she comes back :-)

So what about the trip? Well, a week after passover, they set off. I was recruited on the last minute to drive some of the family and last of the supplies to the port. And so I got to send them off from the boat's berth. (They actually sailed some few kilometers north to Hertzelia where they could go through official border check to legally leave the country.) I also took the official goodbye picture.

Ayelet has been keeping a blog of the trip. It is worthwhile to take a look, as there are some amazing stories.

The observent readers might point out that Ayelet shows up in the pictures from Moran's sendoff party. This is not a mistake. The party was planed for the week Ayelet came back to Israel for a "mid-vacation" break to see her older kids and meet with her extended family.

Another weekend diving

Two weekend days to enjoy diving in Eilat. Many good sights and nice company of local people and fellow divers.

CSLS Retreat

I am one of the heads of the Computer Science and Computational Biology dual-major program at the Hebrew University. The unofficial name more often used is Computer Science - Life Science (CSLS). As part of our activities we hold a yearly retreat with all the undergraduate students in the program, teachers, and some of the program graduates. 

During the retreat the third year students present their senior year project, we have some social activities, discuss the program and issues raised by students at different stages, and have a guest lecturer. 

Our guest lecturer this year was Roy Kishony from Harvard Medical Center who talked about bacteria, anti-biotics, and forces that shape they evolution of anti-bacterial resistance.

The location of the retreat is on the beach in Hof Dor (also known as Tantura, see a wikipeida article on the complex history of the place), south of Haifa, which hosts a very beautiful settings for activities. The location is northen border of the sandy beaches of southern Israel, which are formed by sand from the Nile. From here to the north there are hills of sandstone that form ragged beaches. The location was the southern-most Phoenician  city of Dor, which served as a port for various sea-routes of the Phoenician traders. They also had an active industry for collecting sea shells from which the "Royal Purple" color was manufactured (a very rare and expensive dye in the ancient world). 

Today, the natural lagons are a harbour for fishing boats and a public beach.

We finished the retreat with a short trip in Ramat Hanadiv, a park established by the Baron Edmund de Rothschild Foundation in his memory at the southern part of the Carmel mountain. This includes very nice gardens and a large area for nature conservation 

London and Oxford

I just returned from a quick three day visit to the UK. I was invited to participate in a symposium on "Integrative Network Biology and Cancer" at Institute for Cancer Research in London. This was an excuse to visit collaborators at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics in Oxford and at the Imperial College in London. As such, I found myself giving three different talks in three days :-) Nonetheless it was fun and interesting meeting with multiple colleagues and friends, and also hearing some very interesting talks.  

Although I didn't have time for serious touristic activities, I did get few chances to take pictures. 

Oxford, in particular, was very picturesque.

In London I had fewer chances to go around, but the I still managed to catch few images that I like.

Weekend getaway

After a break of almost three months I went for a weekend of diving in the Red Sea with Matan, my ex-student and dive buddy. Few pictures.

Spring time in Boston

I got invited by the students of The Computational and Systems Biology program (CSBi) at MIT to give a seminar talk and meet with them. It is a great honor to be chosen by the students. This involved two days of meetings with many interesting people at MIT, especially many of the graduate students in the program.

We had a roundtable lunch discussion where Michelle Chan, who coordinated my visit, led with a series of questions about how to choose career paths, scientific problems, and such. I was somewhat unsure as to my qualifications to answer such questions, but the discussion did raise interesting points.

This was also a chance to catch up with many people at the Boston area. I want to thank Michelle for making intensive effort to get the visit perfectly organized, and making sure that everything works smoothly.

Unlike my previous visit to Boston, the weather was definitely show that spring has arrived, and many of the trees were starting to bloom.

The new courtyard between Biology, CS (the (in)famous Stata Center) and the new Koch Institute (cancer research center)

I had a chance to take an afternoon walk toward Boston
 

A somewhat curious squirrel in the Botanical gardens

Site visit to new Engineering Building

As you know, I am a member of the School of Engineering at the university. The school was established more than ten years ago, and it was immediately clear that it needs a physical venue. I was part of a committee that helped define the functional specifications for the building with the architects (a collaboration of a Canadian and an Israeli firm, AJ Diamond, and Kolker, Kolker, and Epstein). The result was plans for a very nice building with multiple functions (offices, research, teaching, student lounges, etc.)  You can learn more about it here.

Due to complex circumstances, the construction of the building was delayed quite a bit, but in the last two years it has been going on in full steam, and hopefully it will be ready for opening in about a year. Today I was invited for a tour of the construction site to see how the interior will look like. I took the opportunity to take some photos of the place. It was raining last week, and so there puddles still on the roof and in some of the large empty spaces (which will become lounges).

Weekend Diving Diversion

After what was a very hectic and busy week, I managed to get a break and go for a two day weekend in Eilat. Didn't manage the usual amount of dives, but the ones we did were very nice. Few photos to give a taste.

Spring trip

Today we have a field trip to celebrate the spring. Actually the trip was organized by Hanah Margalit's group, but they suggested that group lab will join them, due to the relative closeness of our interest and the fact that there are two students that are jointly supervised by Hanah and me.

It was a nice day, not too hot and not cold, so we got to enjoy the end of the spring in the mountains southwest of Jerusalem. The partly clouded sky gave us interesting views.

We used the opertunity to take a group photo (although two people are missing).

And managed to see flowers, insects, birds. We even got a chance to perform some comparative studies

All in all, a very nice day. At the end of it some drove home for the weekend, and few got back to the office and lab to actually get some work done :-)