This Week in Illinois Research

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“This Week in Illinois Research” is a weekly communication for the campus research community, from the Vice Chancellor for Research & Innovation Susan Martinis. 


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Melting Down, Looking Up

From the Vice Chancellor for Research and Innovation

I spent the long Memorial Day weekend dealing with a failing minus-80 freezer—a vital part of my lab that preserves biological samples that I use in my research with RNA. It certainly wasn't the way I had planned to spend five hours over a holiday weekend! As I uncovered lost "treasures" and agonized over whether to keep or toss old samples, I thought fondly about the students and postdocs I've mentored over the years. This big, unexpected job ended up being quite nostalgic as I sorted through the past and reflected on the way things used to be.

That failing freezer seems like a good metaphor for the present moment in higher education. Research is in jeopardy, and things that should feel solid seem to be melting down. We are being forced to evaluate our current state and make very difficult decisions. Yet even now (perhaps now more than ever) we have to find ways to celebrate small victories. In the case of my freezer, I am so grateful to the F&S team and MCB staff for so quickly helping me to mitigate what could have been a significant disruption for my future research and those who build upon it. 

It won't be as easy to repair the meltdown of federal support for research, but we will continue to push back and to find ways to protect what matters most—our communities, and the world-changing work that we do. 

Sincerely,

Susan

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