Peter Davies

Scientists at Janelia work together in multidisciplinary teams to solve challenging biological problems that are difficult to address in other research settings.

Many lab spaces at Janelia feature modular designs and natural light.

Credit: Brad Feinknopf

Occupying 689 wooded acres along the Potomac River, Janelia Farm provides a variety of services and facilities to support its diverse community of scientists and staff—inside and outside the lab.

A view of the Janelia Farm Research Campus at dusk.

Credit: Brad Feinknopf

The Janelia Farm model frees scientists of constraints commonly found in other research environments, providing access to world-class resources and a talented support staff.

Graduate scholar John Tuthill prepares a Drosophila specimen for imaging.

Credit: James Kegley

In addition to our resident scientists and fellows, we offer visiting scientists, graduate, and undergraduate candidates a range of scientific programs.

Graduate scholar Arbora Resulaj (left) and her mentor, Janelia Fellow Dmitry Rinberg (right).

Credit: James Kegley

Janelia Farm regularly hosts scientific meetings, ranging from workshops to intensive, specialized conferences. See what's coming up and visit the archive of past events.

Janelia's large auditorium seats 250 people.

Credit: Matt Staley

Janelia provides outstanding employment opportunities, at all levels.

Credit: James Kegley

Many tools developed in Janelia Farm labs are made freely available to outside researchers, while others are taking shape through collaborations with industry, academia, and government.

A virtual arena for the study of flight in insects.

Credit: James Kegley

Janelia’s sense of community comes from a core belief that people of diverse disciplines and backgrounds can accomplish great things when working with a common purpose.

Research specialist Trevor Wardill (left) and group leader Vivek Jayaraman (right).

Credit: James Kegley

Associate Director, Scientific Computing Software

Contact Me

With over 20 years of Software Engineering experience, Pete Davies is managing the Scientific Computing Software Team for Janelia Farm. After graduating from the US Naval Academy with a B.S. in Computer Science, he spent several years developing flight scheduling and qualification tracking software for the Navy. Pete then transitioned into the civilian world, working on a system simulation of the National Missile Defense System for Raytheon. Subsequently, he has participated as team lead or architect in projects such as satellite imagery scheduling, US Postal Service mail tracking and electronic mortgage closing for Freddie Mac. Pete spent three years working at Celera Genomics, where he led the team that developed the Celera Genome Browser, used to annotate the Human Genome.

His most recent position was at Venter Institute where he was the architect of a BioIT World award winning LIMS which manages VI's large DNA sequencing center. He also developed a software architecture that won the 2006 JBoss Innovation Award for Clustering Technologies in support of high throughput sequence analysis. His last project at VI was leading a group through the conception and initial design of the Community Cyberinfrastructure for Advanced Marine Microbial Ecology Research and Analysis (CAMERA) project in collaboration with the UCSD division of Calit2. This project provides an advanced set of scientific analysis tools for metagenomic study.