June 22

Irrespective of what others are thinking, I am excited about the work I am doing. 

For the CAREER: My career goal is to make a microswimmer that moves efficiently in any ECM. This will change the way diseases are treated, from fibrosis to cancer to biofilms to atherosclerosis. The CAREER award will set me on the path toward reaching that goal.

June 17

The CAREER needs to be a souped-up version of the successful GRFP proposal. You've got to inspire the review panel. It needs to have the same energy, the same verve as that did. 

My dream is to be the guy who used nanotechnology effectively to provide clean water to the world. Or...

My dream is to change the way cancer is treated.

A stroke of inspiration struck me that evening in Tempe. (You could probably draw a causal line, with a decent amount of weight, between then and where I am now.) The same needs to happen this time. 

June 14 - stuff to talk about

Wanting to take a break and simultaneously work all the time

"crushing pressure" to get grants

Dealing with Shrishti

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The talk with JK tonight was helpful. 

I really need to figure out how to break things into fine-grained, doable chunks that I can make my way through. An example is the CAREER. Tomorrow, let me map out the process of applying for the CAREER award, from beginning to end. 

Step by step, all the way to the actual steps.

May 29

I need to be Miguel Garza when he recites the woman's vehicle's VIN number back to her. Memorize her number in one go. Nathan showing encyclopedic sports knowledge.

Unabashed.

May 25

This is the summer I need to completely capitalize on. This may be my last chance to get a viable and vibrant research program up and running.

Pursue self-healing wetsuits.

Pursue the CAREER idea - make nanoswimmers viable for water treatment! As DMW said: "Today a lot of humanity is exposed to harmful contaminants like PFAS that currently goes untreated. The environmental and health costs are large. Such swimmers could destroy them in a wide variety of applications." That's the opening sentence of the proposal.

Pursue DNA nanoswimmers.

Pursue ViroBots. Maybe those should be made out of DNA nanoswimmers.

Pursue Shrishti's project. Maybe DNA NPs need to be Shrishti's project. I could float the idea. Let's see how our preliminary experiments go with the ibidi slides. But 'done' is better than 'perfect' in this case. Maybe we just go with loading and transport of cargo onto the rods and call it a day.

I take inspiration from two things:

• Lucky Adoh (a Twitter follower of mine from Nigeria): "Not all corns pop at the same time." I should remember this when comparing myself to various other assistant professors...
• Remembering the phrase from the episode of Louie: "Say 'I don't know' and you will learn everything." Sooner or later, if I'm going to get somewhere with some of this stuff, I need to admit my shortcomings and express a willingness to learn. Start from wherever I need to start, but always take a step forward.
• Bonus quote, from El Dragón: El regreso de un guerrero: "Don't do anything that is not useful."

OK, I need to get the eff to bed.

May 14

A short note: today, after enjoying some alone time, I think back to around 2009 or 2010 when, under similar circumstances, I wrote a note "a promise to myself." I can't seem to find it anymore. The essence was:

Jeffrey Moran is an animal. A beast. He doesn't take "no" for an answer. He goes for what he wants. He sticks up for the little guy. I promise to honor that man. To be true to him and to allow him to flourish. From now until the end of time.

This summer may be my only chance. Let me charge straight at what my heart and soul truly desire: to use swimmers to make it so more people have drinking water, more people get cures for diseases, more people can breathe easier. To train the next generation of scientists, whether that be Shrishti or Shirin or Sajad or whoever. Let me push myself to be the best version of this Jeffrey I can possibly be. Get up at 6 every morning. Let Nathan inspire you and keep him on his toes at the same time. Let Phil propel you forward. Let Dwight hold your feet to the fire. This is my time. This is my summer.

May 11

I wouldn't have thought the Unabomber would get me thinking the way he has. He was the featured article on Wikipedia the other day, and something about his philosophy was a bit unsettling. Somehow, I got down a bit of a rabbit hole reading about his Luddite nature, the fact that he was initially a genius math professor who ended up being a recluse and living a simple life. 

I make a living developing technology and training others to do the same. Reading about Ted Kaczynski strikes a tone that is critical of my very way of life. I think the way to approach this is to follow the quote attributed to Aristotle: "It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." I must admit, I found something about it disturbing though.

Does technology increase human flourishing, or not? Very complicated question that I probably can't answer fully in one blog post. Certainly, in some ways, it does. But in other ways, it doesn't. Social media is a good example of a modern technology that has extremely positive and extremely negative aspects. But I want to believe that at least some technology can be overall a net benefit to humanity.

As I mentally tossed (what I know of) the Unabomber's thoughts around in my head, entertaining them without accepting them, I ended up here:

I must do all that I can to ensure that the technologies I work on enhance human flourishing and have a minimal negative impact on the environment and on people's lives.

(As a side note, I'm getting better at saying and writing what I truly feel. I felt it when revising the Military Relevance document for the PRMRP proposal today, and felt it a few other times earlier this month when I was getting into the groove of things.)