What kind of research does your lab generally focus on?
We develop machine learning and deep learning methods to analyze big biomedical data.
How difficult was it making the switch from working in the lab on campus to working remotely? What were/are some of the challenges you're facing?
Since our work is entirely computational and dry-lab it was not very difficult. We just moved our lab meetings online. Aside from that we work remotely a lot, by using Slack for communication and sharing code on gGitHub. One challenge was in making sure everyone was OK. There was one person connected with our lab that we couldn't get ahold of for a while and that made us worried. My other challenge is that I now work full time, but I also homeschool my three small kids (ages 7, 5, and 3) at home, so it’s like I have at least 4 jobs now :). It is also hard to get quiet time to read or get certain things done during the day with the kids always running around and being chaotic. I often have to work at night.
Have you ever had to do this before?
I did something very similar when I was on maternity leave with my third daughter in 2017 so it feels somewhat familiar. I started working basically as soon as she was born, but remotely from home just like this. My mom was with us and helping take care of the baby. She is originally from India and in Indian culture you basically quarantine yourself until the baby is a few months old and has immunizations, so constantly staying at home also feels familiar to me from that period.
How are you staying connected with your co-workers from your lab?
We meet by Zoom frequently and we're in communication about specific projects by Slack. We share documents either over Google Docs or Overleaf.
What are your biggest worries concerning your ongoing research/future research?
My biggest worries are for my experimental collaborators. It’s a challenge for them to keep doing their experiments if they are not related to COVID-19. However, one of my collaborators from Australia got special permission because her experiments are on cancer metastasis, which remains an important concern.
Are there any advantages to working remotely?
There are actually many advantages of working remotely, it cuts out commuting, getting dressed in "outside clothes." Spending time trying to get my kids to do the same before their bus comes etc. I am getting to spend a lot of time with my family that I normally don't get to do. The current situation is bringing up different opportunities in research. I am now starting collaborations with scientists in Denmark, China, and Canada to work on various aspects of COVID-19 data. Students in my deep learning class have motivated me to work on protein binding and structural data that I haven't worked with before. So even though I'm not seeing people in New Haven as much, I'm seeing people that I haven't worked with or met before remotely by Zoom and writing grants with them.
Do you have any words of wisdom/message for fellow scientists for getting through this difficult time?
I think we need science more than ever now, so scientists should continue to follow their visions and passions even if its realization is different now.