Photo Walk: Barbican to Tower Bridge
Auguste Comte: mathematical methods in chemistry
This afternoon I attended a talk by Daniel Gillespie creator of the Gillespie algorithm. The talk was very good; but this quote by Auguste Comte which he highlighted caught my attention:
Every attempt to employ mathematical methods in the study of chemical questions must be considered profoundly irrational and contrary to the spirit of chemistry…. if mathematical analysis should ever hold a prominent place in chemistry — an aberration which is happily almost impossible — it would occasion a rapid and widespread degeneration of that science. [Wikipedia]
It reminds me of A Mathematician’s Apology by G. H. Hardy, which seems to have retrospectively rather outdated views on the applicability of certain fields of mathematics.
The price of oranges
This passage from an article in WIRED caught my eye:
In the 40s the allies routinely bombed rail bridges to disrupt supply lines into Nazi-occupied France. After a raid, though, the Royal Air Force couldn’t fly reconnaissance missions over the targets as they were considered too risky, so it didn’t know if a bridge had been destroyed. The Special Operations Executive (SOE), however, came up with a novel strategy for finding out. By monitoring the daily prices of oranges on sale at various fruit stalls Paris, SOE agents dropped behind enemy lines were able to tell which supply chains had been affected.
Cybernetics
I thought this quote from Wiener’s Cybernetics was apt for what CoMPLEX tries to achieve (i.e. interdisciplinary researchers):
If the difficulty of a physiological problem is mathematical in essence, ten physiologists ignorant of mathematics will get precisely as far as one physiologist ignorant of mathematics, and no further. If a physiologist who knows no mathematics works together with a mathematician who knows no physiology, the one will be unable to state his problem in term that the other can manipulate, and the second will be unable to put the answers in any form that the first can understand.
The starling lab
The first three months of my PhD have been an interesting endeavour. I was hindered by a lack of a workspace until almost two months in – which was demotivating. Either I would have to work at home, or cart around everything I need for the day. I shall not complain about the air conditioning in the office! The lab I’m above (the Starling lab) is where Ernest Starling discovered the first hormone (secretin).
Currently I’m trying to build an enzyme kinetic model of the Arf/PIP5K/PLD signalling network. This is progressing much better since Christmas! I will try to get around to writing up more about this at a later date.
[R] Secret Santa
I’ve been organising the Secret Santa for my CoMPLEX year group this year. I thought it was important that no one involved knew the “master list” of who’s Santa was who’s Santee. So I wrote this R script (using the sendmailR and plyr packages) to automatically shuffle names and send emails.
library(sendmailR)
library(plyr)
send.santee <- function(x) {
sendmail(msgFrom, x$Email, msgSubject,
sprintf(msgBody, x$Name, x$Santee),
control=list(smtpServer="smtp.example.com"))
}
# settings
msgFrom <- "me@example.com"
msgSubject <- "Secret Santa"
msgBody <- "Hi %s, your Secret Santa Santee is %s."
# read in list of names/emails
db <- read.csv("secretsanta.csv")
# shuffle names, making sure no one get themself
db$Santee <- db$Name
while(any(db$Santee == db$Name)) db$Santee <- sample(db$Name)
# send the emails
adply(db, 1, send.santee)
Name,Email Rob,rob@example.com Ryan,ryan@example.com Vivien,viv@example.com
Introduction
This has been primarily set up to satisfy the generic skills component of the MRes ‘Modelling Biological Complexity’, for which I am currently studying.
However I fully intend to expand my use of this website into a personal blog, and online CV. I plan on using this as a place to start writing about my thoughts on science – particularly my area of interdisciplinary research – and my experiences as a postgraduate student.
The links at the top of the page talk more about my Education and Interests. Also I am required to link to my completed MRes Projects as PDFs.