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Flojo – a life
With great sadness, Jacqui and Joel shepherded Flojo to her last big sleep at the vet on the weekend. She was with us for 20 of her 22 years and was a part of our lives for so long. We were so lucky to have her as a companion. The house seems much quieter today - even though there are still three more cats sharing the space. Have compiled a (very) small subset of the photos we've taken of her over the years...
Xavier graduates (again!)
Joel managed to miss the graduation by being on the other side of the world but Jason was a more than worthy replacement - ...and Jessica and Karishma also sneaked into the academic procession (I like it - nice work!) so that Xavier got extra applause when he went up on stage. Congratulations Xavier - a big milestone!
Parenthood comes knocking again for Jason!
We welcome Isabelle into the world - and more specifically into Jason and Mel's house. They are currently trying to work out a routine that allows all five members of the household to achieve their goals (e.g., getting fed, sleeping, doing mass spectrometry etc) in an efficient manner. I must confess that I'm not entirely convinced that Matthew (behind) has signed on to give the enterprise his full support yet. 🙂
Joel successful with NHMRC Ideas Grant (hooray!)
Grants from NHMRC and ARC are becoming a bit harder to come by in recent years, so we were very relieved to secure an Ideas Grant working in collaboration with Dr Alex Norman - a peptide chemist and existing collaborator with the group of Richard Payne in Chemistry...
It’s raining babies!
Recent PhD graduate Mehdi and his wife Diba have just welcomed a new family member - their daughter Rosha who was borne at 00:34 on 9 August this year. All are healthy and raring to go on their latest project. And you thought the NuRD complex was challenging,...
Jason wins drug discovery seed grant
Jason has been successful in winning a $15,000 grant from the ECR seed funding program of the USyd Drug Discovery Initiative. This grant will help him pursue his mRNA-display based hunt for inhibitors of oncogenic transcription factors. Super stuff Jason!
Did I already mention that there are a lot of lab babies appearing lately?
Announcing the arrival into the world of Oren Lucev O’Connell, born on last Saturday morning at 3:49 am (GMT -4) and weighing in at 8lb 2oz. Direct report from new dad Mitch: "Mum (Annabelle) and baby are doing wonderfully, and we’re having fun adjusting to our new...
*Another* lab baby! Where are they all coming from?
Well, this one is coming to us courtesy of Jason and his wife Mel (mostly Mel) - he hasn't been given a name yet, so I think we'll just call him X. Actually, that could be quite a cool name... Here is is pictured with his elder brother Michael - who looks much...
Welcome to Adnan Shaik!
Dr Anjumara Shaik, who has been working with our collaborator Alyson Ashe on transgenerational epigenetic inheritance, has just become a new mother on 3 June - and here you can see her husband Asif Pasha and her new son Adnan (who doesn't look that pleased about...
Joel’s Braidwood-Bermagui bike weekend
With the lack of international bike touring possibilities at the moment, Joel's been looking for options closer to home. Last weekend, he loaded up his gravel bike and headed south to do a loop from Braidwood to Bermagui on the coast, and back a different way...
Lorna weaves (well, knits) her magic!
Lorna has been busy preparing for the Sydney Royal Easter Show - and has come up with the goods. Her knitted fingerless mittens have snared first prize at the Show in the Adult Knitted Accessories division. Storming work Lorna. I'm expecting a lab coat...
Joel hits the trails in the UTA 50-km race
A friend of Joel's had to pull out of the Ultra Trail Australia 50-km race in the Blue Mountains recently and offered Joel his entry at short notice. Given that he wasn't in 'race shape' - whatever that means - he went for the social option and ran the event...
Ahhh – it’s still one of my favourite sights in science…
...a sweet 15N-HSQC titration. Last minute effort to add that extra piece of preliminary data to the grant application - and who would have believed that it would actually pan out - but it did! All thanks to Ingrid's protein production skills and Alex Norman's...
Xmas stroll in the Royal National Park
Joel and Jacqui took advantage of the cool weather to head down the RNP and see what the wildflower situation was like. It's still pretty impressive - and we even spotted some native orchids with amazing dappled petals. The bridge at Audley is very Monet-esque...
You don’t get this aesthetic beauty from Alphafold…
We have just solved a structure working with SOLES colleague Tara Christie (not to mention Toby Passioura and Rich Payne). The structure determination was a bit of a wrestle for Tara (as you'd expect at 3.9 A!), but gee - you can't help but love the packing in the...