virology blog
About viruses and viral disease
The Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mt. Sinai recently conducted the first PhD Lab Coat Ceremony in New York City. I was honored to be the Keynote Speaker at this event. My address follows.
Forty-three years ago this month I was in your shoes. I had just joined the PhD program in biomedical sciences here at Mt. Sinai, and while we didn’t have a white coat, it was exciting times nonetheless.
I sat in the green room, 15 minutes before the start of the event, more nervous than I had been for a presentation in recent years. The occasion was the keynote address, which I was about to present before 1500 attendees at the 2018 annual meeting of the American Society for Virology.
I was nervous for two reasons. First, I was trying something completely different for the keynote, and I was not sure if it would be welcomed.
The other reason for my nerves was that my companion for the keynote had not yet arrived.