Interview with Alan Frankel by Alexa Rocourt

Q: In a couple sentences, tell me about what you do in your work.

A: We work on basic virology and structural biology. In particular we focus on HIV and we’ve been looking at a couple key proteins that are involved in gene regulation and how those proteins interact with the host cell. We’re trying to understand both the basic biology and potentially find some targets for new drugs.

Q: What’s your favorite part about being a scientist?

A: The creativity and the ability to come up with ideas and pursue them. And also helping to inspire people (postdocs and students) to have that creative spirit. 

Q: What have you created or discovered that you are most proud of?

A: We’ve made some very nice insights into the structure of one of these key HIV proteins, and to get to where we were took some creativity, even though the net result of it was very straight forward, in the sense that we ended up with a structure. To get to that took a lot of time.

Q: At the end of the day, why does your work matter?

A: Mostly because it contributes to basic knowledge, it’s the potential for therapeutic benefit, and it is the educational experience. 

Q: Outside of work, what do you do to relax?

A: Biking. I bike to work everyday from Mill Valley. I make the time to relax. I have a couple of kids and they’re bikers too, so we do a ton of that together. We have what we call a “death ride” coming up in a couple of weeks, so we’re training for that. It’s a big ride, it’s out near Tahoe, it’s 130 miles and a few thousand feet of climbing at altitude. So we have a lot to get ready for that. 

Q: What situation do you think you’d feel the most out-of-place in?

A: Big group settings.

Q :In 100 years, what do you want to be remembered for? 

A: The biggest legacy would be through the kids and what they do. But scientifically, just to have a couple bits of information that we contributed that make it through history and stand the test of time...that would be good.