Tom Doeppner’s Retirement: A Modest Proposal: The Tom & Eli Index
- Posted by Jesse Polhemus
- on Feb. 2, 2026
by Sorin Istrail, James A. and Julie N. Brown Professor of Computational and Mathematical Sciences
Thinking about Tom, and our work together in the Department, several passionate themes come to mind – so many that I’ve only been able to write them at this final moment. Such themes as his exceedingly large number of answers to my computational biology concentration questions, or how much I enjoyed working with Trina during my tenure as director of CCMB (2006-2011) where she was part of our dream team and with whom I co-wrote the funded NSF proposal “Sweat-box sessions: The art of asking tough questions.” Also, DUS Tom’s attendance at all my honor theses presentations – attended as well by the second faculty thesis reader, collaborators, author’s parents and friends and during which the thesis author can show her/his technical brilliance with enough time for the technical talk and cake too! – and his majestic sea urchin photographs, images of such color and complexity they rival van Gogh’s artwork, that accompany my talks about the Regulatory Genome of Eric Davidson, my most influential professor, closest friend, and mentor in the past 25 years. Professor Eric Davidson passed away ten years ago in 2015.
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