Harvard Retreat 2010: Lorette Noiret
Lisa Willis and
I visited the Harvard System Biology Department from the 14th to the 19th of
May. The visit was extremely fruitful, and I am really thankful to Matt Wakelin
for organizing it and to CoMPLEX for allowing us to go.
This visit could
be split in two parts: during the first three days, Lisa and I attended the
departmental retreat in Sebasco Harbor Resort, and during the last days we
visited some laboratories and met researchers and students at Harvard medical
campus.
The retreat was
organized as a series of talks performed by the departmental group leaders, and
two series of poster session presented by the PhD students. The aim was to
provide an overview of the research performed in the department, the latest
results of each lab and their directions of work. It was a fantastic
opportunity to discover about a wide variety of biological areas and to develop
a general idea about the System Biology Department as a whole. Regarding my
research project, I was particularly impressed by some of the teams working on
energy metabolism, and this informal context allowed me to discuss with these
top researchers. It was also interesting/informative to see the place allocated
to mathematical/physical modelling, and to realise that it is still limited to
some specialized teams.
The poster
session was an opportunity to present my research project and to explain what
CoMPLEX is.
After the
retreat, Lisa and I spent a few days in Boston. We took this opportunity to
visit some laboratories. I met Dr Higgins who develops mathematical models in a
medical context, Dr Thomas Maiwald, whose work focus on estimating parameter
values from experimental data, and Prof Mitchison, who work focused on cytoskeleton. The discussions were really
interesting, and I specially enjoyed having the views of these researches on
the place of mathematics in biological sciences. Dr Maiwald developed a
software to help estimating/optimizing unobservable parameters which combine
mathematical modelling and experimental data, which I found particularly
useful. (Note: if several CoMPLEX students are interested, Dr Maiwald agreed to
present his approach / software during a 1-day workshop at the end of the year
as he will be in Europe during this period). Finally I met the departmental
administrator who provided useful information on how to apply and to find a
funding to join the System Biology Department.
Overall, I am
extremely pleased I went to this retreat. Apart from the research perspective,
I thought visiting the labs and discovering the culture/people of such a
prestigious institution was extremely fruitful.
Page last modified on 03 apr 11 22:50
