Last week I spent a lot of time with some genome specialists who work at the Venter Institute. On Thursday I was given an update on the results coming in from Sorcerer II‘s trip to Europe and the Mediterranean as well as results from the sampling we have been doing on my boat Solutions. As you may remember, we sample once a month along the California Bight. The status of things is that a tremendous amount of data has been acquired. However, very few of the samples have been sequenced at the present time. My feeling is that the people doing the sampling are the same people who do the sequencing. I was impressed with the care that these scientists take in handling and storing the samples.
I watched the Oscars Sunday night and was surprised to see The Hurt Locker win. I thought it was an interesting movie, but one that looked pretty staged to me. I’d rather have seen one of Matt Damon’s movies win, or Avatar. I haven’t seen Avatar, but I hear it’s very good. The Academy marches to its own drummer. I’m curious what the 400 blog readers thought about the award results.
— Bob