A new beginning

The past few weeks have been the start of my new beginning as a grad student at UC Berkeley. While the process of settling in, figuring things out, exploring my surroundings, meeting new people, etc. is still ongoing, I feel that things have reached a point where I actually have an update to provide.

This week was the first week of our first rotation. I've been assigned to the Kuriyan lab, whose primary focus is on the molecular mechanisms of EGFR (epidermal growth factor receptor) signaling to downstream effectors. For those of you who are unfamiliar with this topic, it is one of the classic examples of signal transduction, the process by which cells communicate with one another to coordinate and control processes ranging from development to growth to changes in nutritional input. EGF happens to be one of the best studied systems since it is implicated in so many processes and cancers. What I find great about the work in this lab is that they are examining such a well-studied system from so many viewpoints and continue to find really cool, interesting, and surprising things about the mechanisms of EGFR action, mechanisms that can potentially be found in other systems as well.

Classes have been going well - biochemistry is ridiculously work intensive, and cell biology is simply not my area of expertise by far and is thus a bit overwhelming with so many different cyclin/CDK names. My classmates this year are a joy to be around - every single one of them is extremely nice and fun to be around. I look forward immensely to continuing to get to know them.

As for my life outside of campus, my rooming situation with Elaine and Jean has been awesome. They are two wonderful, sweet girls and are extremely easy to live with. Their high standards of cleanliness and neatness keep me in check! Makes for a great living space. =)

I'm starting to explore Berkeley and San Francisco a bit - looking for new places to eat, going out to bars & clubs, etc. The touristy things I've already gotten a taste for the last 2 times I was here, but those are certainly not things I'd shy away from. There remains quite a lot to be seen.

Really minor things continue to hamper my progress (printer isn't working, having problems with setting up furniture in my room, curtains aren't what they should be, computer remains broken and needs to be fixed), but all in all things are going very smoothly and I'm enjoying a wonderful fall semester thus far!