Iris Young (he/they/she) (PhD)<p>I guess instance migration is a good time for an <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/Introduction" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Introduction</span></a> post. Hello lovely people, I'm here both as a scientific researcher and as a human being, and you can expect a range of genres of posts and interactions from me.</p><p><strong>On the work side,</strong> I'm a computational scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in the field of biological X-ray crystallography, specifically at free electron lasers. It's a glorious interdisciplinary mess, and the description I give to non-scientists is that i use my degree in chemistry to write software to do math that models the physics of experiments that we're running to learn about biology.</p><p><strong>For fellow structural biologists:</strong> I work on crystallography data reduction software for the steps between photons hitting the detector and a merged set of structure factors. I also support XFEL experiments, both on site and remotely, and assist in post-experiment data processing as needed. My PhD focused on using simultaneous XFEL crystallography and XES spectroscopy to probe the water splitting reaction in oxygenic photosynthesis. I did a postdoc in computational methods development for cryoEM, and I'm now back to XFEL crystallography but still in methods development.</p><p><strong>For fellow software developers:</strong> all of our work is open source and mostly under the <a href="https://github.com/cctbx/cctbx_project" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">cctbx</a> project/repo. It's mostly python with a bunch of C++ under the hood (including some low-level stuff redundant with scipy and numpy because those weren't around yet!), plus a user-facing wxPython GUI. More recently we've done a ton of work with GPU acceleration (using Kokkos, for NVIDIA, Intel and AMD architectures) and scaling up at three different national labs' supercomputing centers in anticipation of next-gen experimental capabilities. I derive too much joy from writing bash-sed-awk monstrosities on the occasions we need them to fix an urgent problem during an experiment, and I guess I'm most proud of the fact that I somewhat understand git.</p><p><strong>As far as hobbies,</strong> the longest-standing one is probably <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/coffee" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>coffee</span></a>, followed closely by <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/language" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>language</span></a> (s) / <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/languageLearning" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>languageLearning</span></a> and a love of <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/patterns" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>patterns</span></a> and <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/symmetry" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>symmetry</span></a> in various contexts. I have too many different ways of making coffee (they have overrun my coffee cupboard), but my favorite remains the classic latte, and by now I can make a better latte than I can buy. I'm trying to refresh my <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/Japanese" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Japanese</span></a> and learn <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/Dutch" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Dutch</span></a> and <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/German" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>German</span></a> simultaneously/comparatively, which of course is terrible for speed of learning, but fascinating. So far I've found <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/ASL" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>ASL</span></a> the most challenging but also deeply satisfying -- I only have one semester under my belt but hope to take a lot more. I studied and continue to study all the <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/math" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>math</span></a> and <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/science" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>science</span></a> I possibly can. Right now I seem to be pretty engrossed in <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/electronics" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>electronics</span></a>, <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/CAD" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>CAD</span></a>, <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/3DPrinting" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>3DPrinting</span></a>, and just generally <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/DIY" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>DIY</span></a>-ing/fixing/repairing things. Other active interests include <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/sewing" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>sewing</span></a>, <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/reading" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>reading</span></a>, <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/cooking" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>cooking</span></a>, <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/bike" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>bike</span></a> commuting, and <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/publicTransit" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>publicTransit</span></a>. My journeys in <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/aikido" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>aikido</span></a> and <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/pottery" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>pottery</span></a> are on hold but I definitely want to pick them back up when I'm not already overcommitted. I'm casually interested in <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/neurophilosophy" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>neurophilosophy</span></a>, <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/neuropsychology" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>neuropsychology</span></a>, <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/neurodivergence" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>neurodivergence</span></a> and <a href="https://neuromatch.social/tags/neuroscience" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>neuroscience</span></a>. I've taken one course in neurophilosophy and can read literature in the rest, with effort.</p><p><strong>On a personal note,</strong> I'm trans and nonbinary and very open about it -- I transitioned back when I had to explain what that meant. I've retired from some forms of community engagement and support but I'm very happy to answer any questions I can about the US legal and medical landscapes, available resources, policy and terminology best practices, or whatever you know you shouldn't ask [person in your life].</p><p>Finally, I spend a lot of time with my cat Rory (pictured), who is perfect and the most affectionate creature I have ever met. I promise to share photos of him from time to time.</p>