[Neuropostdocs] Dr. Larry Young's visit cancelled

[Christian Beaulé]

Good day,

It is with disappointment that I have to announce that our second 
postdoc-invited speaker, Dr. Larry Young from Emory will not be able to 
come to UIUC and give his seminar (scheduled for April 12th 2005). 
Unfortunately for all parties involved, the National Science Foundation 
called a meeting on that date and they insisted on Dr. Young's 
presence. We tried to shuffle other speakers around to accommodate with 
no success. We will try to have him speak in the fall.

There are a couple options that are open to us at this point.

1- We can ask some of the other speakers that were selected and made 
our list if they are available. Here are the names:
	Stephen Strittmatter (Yale)
	John Hildeband (Arizona)
	Janis Weeks (Oregon)
	Bruce McEwen (Rockfeller)
	Larry Abbott (Brandeis)

	Note that these speakers are likely to be already booked and our 
chance for success is low.

2- We do an extended version of the Postdoc Datablitz that some of us 
did for the Neuroscience Program Retreat last fall. This time, instead 
of a 1 slide, 1 minute talk, we could do something like 3 slides, 5 
minutes with a 1 min question period (to be determined by the number of 
participants).

Personally, I would go for option #2. We have the April 12th spot 
reserved for a postdoc-hosted seminar event. It would offer all of us 
some visibility in the NSP program with fellow postdocs, faculty, and 
graduate students. Everyone has some data for a 5 min talk (and for 
those who have just joined the postdoc crowd, you have you PhD data to 
talk about).

I'm asking for your input. It's a democracy, the choice of the majority 
will win between the two options. I'm asking you to answer quickly in 
order to ensure sufficient time for planning.

Christian