Worrying.

The past few months have been frightening. Trump, Musk, and their followers have decided that authoritarianism and fascism are the future of the United States. Between their attacks on higher education, trans people, and immigrants, I do not think it is an exaggeration to say that the future of the United States is at stake.

Call it what it is. Do not obey in advance, and remember that even little things matter.

School

• Organic Chemistry. Loving solid phase peptide synthesis! I happened to find a physical copy of Merrifield’s original paper in a symposium proceedings book at a used bookstore in San Diego last week (did not buy, was very expensive).
• Probability Theory. We’re covering expectation now, and I finally understand what those integrals from quantum mechanics meant. I think that this is going to be very cool if I can manage to wrap my head around it. It’s also neat to learn where many statistical tools come from!
• Cellular Biology. Molecular biology techniques are awesome and I love learning about them. No further comments.
• Linguistics. We’ve since moved into morphology, which scratches that particular itch of mine to break words down into parts.

Research!

I was named a 2025 Goldwater Scholar, which was an unexpected honor! I am very thankful to everyone who supported me: my mentors Dennis, Eden, and Scott; the Coyle lab; the Boros lab; my friends who made me go iceskating to destress; and of course my family. I wouldn’t have made it nearly this far alone.

The lab has been very exciting, with new results on some experiments and some collaborations beginning to bear fruit. We also recently preprinted two manuscripts!

Rajasekaran, R.; Galateo, T. M.; Xu, Z.; Bolshakov, D. T.; Weix, E. W.; Coyle, S. M. Genetically encoded protein oscillators for FM streaming of single-cell data bioRxiv February 28, 2025, p 2025.02.28.640587.

Bolshakov, D. T.; Weix, E. W.; Galateo, T. M.; Rajasekaran, R.; Coyle, S. M. Noise-guided tuning of synthetic protein waves in living cells bioRxiv March 21, 2025, p 2025.03.21.644572.

Reading

One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar El Akkad. Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan. Currently working through Elif Batuman’s The Idiot, Hannah Arendt’s The Human Condition, and Jesmyn Ward’s Let Us Descend.