Life of a Lab Rat

April and May are lovely months of the year in countries where you can actually tell the difference between the seasons. Boris Johnson talks about chestnut candles, and it is with a slight pang that I realize I have missed the daffodils and cowslips, and soon the may blossom and bluebells will be out.

I write this because I found out on Friday that the cycle path Cambridgeshire Council had been wittering on about for years has finally opened. I remember the council promising to do it, and starting surveying — and then there was a hiatus as they said it would have to be lit at night and that would be too expensive. But all of a sudden it has been built and opened (from start to finish under a year. Amazing).

The path links one of the villages to the Addenbrookes hospital site, upon which is the MRC Lab of Molecular Biology, where I spent six years solving protein structures and generally having a wonderful time. I had to cycle up Granham's Hill (in the snow, once. That was interesting) to get to work, and the path across the fields would have made the journey much more pleasant (not so much because it cuts out the hill, but because it avoids the traffic).

But the really cool thing, from a scientist's perspective, is that the council painted the nucleotide sequence of BRCA2 on the path in colour. I have not been able to find any decent photos of it yet, though. I will have to go back one day and ride along it.