Not to worry, the real-life Dr. M. Reza Ghadiri is still a professor at The Scripps Research Institute in California. I am talking about a lesser known, electronic, Reza Ghadiri. Here's the story.
Remember Clippit, the annoying paperclip character from Microsoft Office 97 and 2003? It was the same kind of thing, except it looked like The Sims version of Reza Ghadiri himself. Imagine that, a custom-made Office Assistant! Animated, it would move its little bald head, play with models of cyclic peptides and make questionable (or, frankly, obscene) hand gestures. It came with a repertoire of phrases too. Including something like "Welcome to the world of bullshit. There is much you can learn here" and "We will publish lots of papers".
I was still new to the Ghadiri group when I discovered it on one of the laboratory computers. I remember having a Holy crap, Batman! moment, and wondering if anyone else was aware of this "customization". How long would it take for Reza to find out?
And... nothing happened. There is a reason why they don't shoot reality TV shows in research labs. I don't think Reza the professor ever found out. So Reza the office assistant lived on. Somehow I never got around to making a copy, or a screencast, of it. But it was still there last time I checked. Who knows, it might still be there now — ready to go with a click of a button.
comments for this post
I've been a student of science for over 10 years. Most of that time I worked in academic research labs. The last and the longest time – in the laboratory of Dr. 
Did you consider the possibility that Reza has actually seen it?
I would assume that, for all his (presumed) faults you could credit him with some sense of humor.
For those of you who might be wondering, making a custom assistant was (is) pretty easy.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/213731
(the images can be customized by directly messing around with the resources)
I considered the possibility of Dr. Ghadiri seeing it, but it's unlikely. Reza just did not go around loading up MS Word or Excel on laboratory computers. No reason to. The other way for him to find out would be for someone else to 1) know and 2) tell him. That computer's primary use was not document editing. Reza does have a sense of humor, but if someone were to show him that thing (again, what for?) and he somehow happened to be ok with it, the group would have been talking. It was not a joke. More like ridicule with some rather strong accusations implied.
Can the Reza assistant be found on the web?
I wish it could be. I'm kicking myself for not grabbing a copy while I was there and kind of hoping somebody else can get their hands on it and upload it. It was pretty neat, very nicely done.
good job, buddy. I like your style.