A Run Down Memory Lane

I just got back from the coolest trip. I met Zeynep Madak-Erdogan on twitter a year or so ago (thank you #bcsm!), and when I saw that she was a breast cancer researcher at the University of Illinois, we quickly bonded as I told her about my time there. In the months since, she has asked me to work with her on a few different projects, and she even invited me to come to campus as the Cancer Community @ Illinois starts a new cancer research advocacy group!

I’m going to get some of the “official photos” soon and I’ll share a little of the more science-y stuff I did there, but until then, the fun stuff! Zeynep and the rest of the cancer working group set up a great itinerary for me, but she was sure to ask if I wanted her to arrange any specific meetings. My only request was dinner at Papa Del’s, which apparently made me one of the cooler campus visitors and showed my UIUCroots to anyone who hadn’t already heard I was an alum. We drove around campus, and seeing the buildup of research park on the south farms where there used to be nothing but sheep was probably the biggest change. Fortunately (or unfortunately?) there are still some farms on the other side of First Street, so I immediately recognized the familiar smell of spring on the South Farms.

My other request was a slightly later start on the second day so that I could get in a run to visit some of my old haunts. Of course, as a student, I wasn’t a runner, so roller blading or taking the Red bus would have been more accurately nostalgic way to get around campus, but I enjoyed taking my new habit to my old stomping grounds.

Of course I had to snap a quick picture with the Alma Mater and on the Quad, which like the Union and much of campus, were as I remembered them. (My apologies if this one is upside down. WordPress and I can not agree on how to make it right side up on all devices. Agh!) At one point, we were noticing all the new hipster food trucks near the Beckman Institute and I commented that the only food truck in my day was the weird smelling silver truck outside Noyes Lab. When we walked past that spot moments later, Derald’s Catering Truck was still there, as if it had never moved, save to get a snazzy new paint job on one side!)

This is the entrance to one of the new buildings on campus– the Carl Woese Institute of Genomic Biology. Besides the cutting edge science that goes on inside the building, the art of science is prominently featured throughout the building with temporary themed exhibits. These three sculptures outside the building show tRNA at three different stages.

Green Street looked different, too, with many high rise buildings towering up over the familiar streetfront stores and restaurants. But IGB is probably one of the shortest new buildings on campus, built only a few stories high because of its proximity to the Morrow Plots– the oldest continuously planted experimental cornfield in the United States. And as all my fellow Illini friends know, you can’t throw shade on the corn! (OK, it’s a long video, but gives you the whole story of the Morrow Plots and why the Undergrad Library is underground. The song starts at around 8:30.)

I had a great visit and especially enjoyed my run down memory lane. Stay tuned for some pictures of me dressed like a grown up and being all professional and everything to find out why I was actually there!