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WEEK TWO - Learning the Project

This week, like last week, was spent mainly in reading and learning about the project. In particular, I spent a lot of time going through Marta's paper and paying particularly close attention to her growth function for zooplankton. There were quite a few of the biology and ecology related terms and ideas that were unfamiliar, but it was fun to learn about them and discover how interrelated all of the ocean organisms are. I was also surprised to notice my own progress throughout the week. I read Marta's paper last week to prepare for our teleconference and was pretty unclear on many of the ideas. But after a couple days of literature review and some conversations with Grant, I reread the paper and was really comfortable with the material. So that was some encouragement!

Onto the modeling side of the project: Grant had already worked up a two dimensional model for zooplankton. So, I've been trying to become as familiar with MATLAB as I can and I've been going through his code and getting acquainted with how the whole modeling process works. My job will be to build upon his work and expand the model into three dimensions and also to incorporate some of our new knowledge about the growth function. So that will be my job for week three: getting started on my three-dimensional model (which I'm sure will require a lot of help from Grant). We are also thinking about visiting the University of Washington to observe some of their zooplankton cultures. This would allow me to get some idea of how these organisms actually move, which would help to make the model more realistic. And we have the NSF visit to look forward to this week, which should be really interesting!

Outside of the academic area of week two: We moved into the apartment this Monday and it's great! I also did some more exploring of Portland. On Thursday, Vanessa took us on a trip to tour the main OHSU campus. It was one of the prettiest campuses I've seen. The tram ride was definitely a highlight, since we could see both Mt. Hood and Mt. St. Helen's! Friday, we went downtown to the Crystal Ballroom to check out a concert (and the floor really is a little bouncy...you should go there if you don't know what I'm talking about!). And on Sunday, a few of us went to the Oregon Zoo. I'll post some pictures from my trips just as soon as we get internet service in the apartment (Tuesday!)