Nunatak comes out of the closet.

I couldn't let Peter hog all of the limelight, so here's me, above. I've also updated my nunatak blogger profile with my real-life details.

To make a 33-year-long story short, I've got a PhD in genetics from the University of Washington in Seattle and work full time as a postdoctoral researcher in the Botany department at the Natural History Museum, where I also coordinate science projects for the museum's Darwin200 campaign. I also volunteer as science coordinator for The Beagle Project, hence this blog.

This summer I am participating in a research project to collect morphological and DNA specimens of every plant species in Darwin's meadow at Down House as a pilot study for field, curatorial and laboratory procedures that we will use to eventually "DNA barcode" the whole British flora. I'll be talking about this project at a public event at the Natural History Museum on Friday 25th of May.

So, you may be wondering, why “nunatak”? A nunatak (nuhn-uh-tak), from the Inuktitut, meaning "lonely peak", is a mountain or rock rising above a large ice sheet or poking out of a glacier. This is usually caused by the nunatak being composed of sturdier stuff than the surrounding landscape. In addition to my love for all things mountainous and glacial (see photo of me telemark skiing in Switzerland above), I like to think of myself as one who resists downward flow in the context of science and society. A good example of such downward flow is the pseudo-scientific idea of Intelligent Design, which I will not honor here with a link.