I'm unlikely ever to win a Nobel Prize. As a result, I've got to take in the excitement of winning when it even comes near me. With this year's winners announced, I've got my shot!

I don't blog much about work; it just doesn't seem like a good thing to talk about. But here's a blog that sort of addresses work, and even shows me at the office.

My employer just notched up another Nobel Prize in physics via George Smoot, making him our 11th, and 10th for actual work done at the laboratory. (Our director has a Nobel in physics, but it was for work done at Stanford.)

Then, the news came today that the Nobel prize winner in Chemistry, Roger Kornber, "did do some of his prize-winning research at the Advanced Light Source. Kornberg used the crystallography facilities at ALS beamlines 5.0.2 and 8.2.1 to identify some of the substructures of RNA polymerase in action, the protein that converts DNA into RNA through the process known as transcription. Kornberg and his group were among the first to capitalize on the crystal automounter robots at 5.0.2, which enabled them to screen numerous crystals to find the best."

I spent my first year at the lab supporting the collection and processing systems at beamlines 5.0.2 and 8.2.1. I still support their servers (but I, fortunately, don't have to touch them very often.) This is me figuring I'd make the systems problems irrelevant at beamline 8.2.1.

It's almost like I won myself. Almost. Sort of.

You can still win a Nobel Prize for nobility!!

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