Joseph F. Clark, Ph.D.

I was privileged enough to be asked to Ritsumeikan University  Shiga, Japan as an invited lecturer asked to give a series of lectures during their concentrated summer program. The theme of the lecture program was “brain pathologies and therapies.” Yes that is a broad topic, but they wanted personal expert presentations focusing on those areas [...]

The following is an annotated and redacted conversation from the GAMT support group on facebook. https://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/189179557787307/. Some of us participated in the dialogue and wanted to share this with the broader community. I’ve tried to stay true to the meaning and provide transitions between comments from individuals participating in the discussion. Please remember to always [...]

what is out on the web needs to be examined carefully and often can be dangerously inadequate.

The first day and a half for Renee was relatively low stress with just simple chats and lunch talks. During the first research discussion I had with Renee she made it clear that I was very welcome in her lab, that she expected me there in January (18 months from now) and that she had [...]

There were two pivotal meetings scheduled for Renee that could shape the perception of the success or failure of the trip. One was her talk to the Department of Physiology, and the second was a one-on-one meeting with Ron Myer. Dr. Myer was a known opponent of the compartmentation theory and Dr. Ventura-Clapier was a [...]

It was important for me to get a grant to support my research because the politics of higher education and research are an amalgam of the altruistic scientist who wants to do the greatest good for humankind and may put his or her life at risk to expand human knowledge, and the empire builder in [...]

Ann and I had many conversations about my putative plans to go to Paris to do my postdoctoral studies. She felt that she could not spend a whole year out of the country. She was close to her family and did not want to be away from them. Her pilot lessons were also going well [...]

It is sometimes hard to comprehend all the work that goes on in the scientific community. This is because there are multiple disciplines in science and these can overlap and get complicated. Confusion occurs because sometimes the scientific terms used can be different depending upon which community you talk to. For example, physicists and chemists [...]

After lunch Dad drove all four of us to the local airport where his plane was. I was going to get a ride in a two-seater Piper Cub. I’d been on lots of planes before, but never a small propeller-driven plane like this. As we drove through the airport Dad gave us a tour of [...]

We were going to meet Ann’s parents, and the drive from Lansing to Flint, Michigan, where they lived, was only about an hour. I had met several members of her family already and gotten the seal of approval from them. But now I was meeting Mom and Dad, and felt as nervous as if I [...]