No gym this week :*(

Gym has been going really well. I'm in the middle of Phase 2 of Eric Cressey's Maximum Strength, getting used to all the new workout styles (front squats, box squats, rack pulls, rotator cuff work, lots of unilateral leg work, cluster sets, speed work).

Unfortunately I managed to hurt my lower back 2 weeks ago, through some rather poor deadlifting technique. It seemed to be ok, but now it seems to be getting sore again. Taking a week off the gym to let it recover. I considered going to the dr, but I don't think they are going to say much other than rest it and take anti inflammatory drugs (of which I might try buying some tomorrow). Really annoying to be out of the gym, hopefully I've learnt my lesson, and I just hope my back heals itself soon. I'm stretching it and using a tennis ball and foam roller for some self myofascial release.

I've been working

That's my excuse for no updates recently. But the stats say people are still visiting occasionally, so I oughta at least say hi!

I took some time off at Christmas to write up. The only problem is, that I got very little writing done. Partly this was because of writers block. Ask anyone who has done their PhD. It's insanely difficult to get started on your thesis. It just looms over you, like an unborn monolith.

Of course, realising I hadn't as yet finished playing Mass Effect on the XBox 360 had nothing to do with it. This is the first game, not the recent sequel. I actually purchased it over a year ago, but got bored fairly quickly. I decided I ought to give it another shot, especially since I'm too poor to buy any new games at the moment. Once I got into it, I actually really enjoyed it. You control a character named Shepherd (first name, gender and appearance can be chosen at will; there are also quite a few options in picking his/her past history which influences how other characters relate to you). It's a scifi RPG, where you basically play a soldier who has been chosen to represent humanity at a very high level in galactic politics. It's your job to figure out why a highly decorated alien supersoldier has gone AWOL. As you progress through the game, you can pick up allies. Each mission lets you take two such allies along, allowing you to pick which sorts of skills you want to complement your own. You can either follow lots of side plots, or carry through the main mission, which follows a standard plot of uncovering the history of an ancient alien race, wiped out by an even more powerful and ancient alien race. It's still v gripping and exciting. I did find driving the MAKO allterrain vehicle incredibly annoying, and all the bases and derelict ship interiors look identical. The romance subplots were amusing.

Still, I am now finally in the groove of writing my thesis. Of course, I promised my supervisor I would hand in the first three chapters by today - I've only handed in one, half finished the second, not even started the third. Eek!

I'm still working in the lab, so here's a treat for you. This is an important figure from my future thesis. I'm interested in investigating a certain protein, which we shall call X. In order to see how X works, it's useful to know what other proteins X plays with. To do that, I am using antibodies that recognise X, in a reaction called an Immunoprecipitation. Basically, you take cells grown in cell culture labs, break them up to release all their proteins, and then incubate them with your antibody which is stuck to tiny little beads. You then remove the cell proteins and keep the beads. Hopefully the antibody on the beads has grabbed your protein out, along with all other proteins that interact with Protein X. You then spread them out on an acrylamide gel, and use silver to make them visible.

The pic shows in the right hand lane a very dark band representing my protein, and lots of lighter bands, representing potential proteins that work with my protein X.