There's a lot of evidence that grazing can improve plant biodiversity (although there are exceptions). Mostly, though, it doesn't seem to improve carbon sequestration, and sometimes decreases it. But grazing, like politics, is local. All depends on conditions/climate/management.

A new study suggests that, when it comes to LDL cholesterol, the lower the better. www.nejm.org/doi/full/10....

This is brilliant news: when I went to the Congo with MSF about 20 years ago, doctors were still having to do lumbar punctures on kids with no anaesthetic, and using an antiquated treatment based on strychnine that was fatal to half the patients...

If this works, it's crazy important. It's a viable way to generate nitrogen fertilizer on-farm, replacing Haber-Bosch. ambrook.com/offrange/tec...

Genetic engineering FTW! GE yeast provides essential nutrients to honeybees, and improves reproduction and health wildly. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Some countries have better farming policies than others, wasting less public money and boosting productivity more than pollution. Surprisingly, England has earned the right to boast

No diet is better than any other, Exhibit #48739 This time, it's time-restricted eating vs. calorie counting. Same results: about 4.5% of body weight over 6 months. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Obesity can raise cancer risk because organs grow to accommodate the larger body. They grow, in part, by adding new cells. More cells = more chances for a cell to go rogue/cancerous. Doubling organ size may double cancer risk in that organ.

Not now unstoppable mushroom we’re busy here

This is an important milestone. A product made with cultivated beef combined with plant-based stuff is indistinguishable from beef. I don't know what kind of cut it was, and I still don't think we're anywhere close to a medium-rare filet, but this is real progress.

In blind taste tests, AlephFarms' cultivated beef was indistinguishable from conventional beef on taste/texture www.greenqueen.com.hk/aleph-farms-...

Boston folks, come by tomorrow.

Illegally trading on inside information is stealing. They are stealing.

Nutrition advice is often unreliable. Here are 3 things you can count on. wapo.st/4bYDRgB by @tamarhaspel.bsky.social 🙏 "Eat a wide variety of whole-ish foods you enjoy, in quantities consistent with the weight you want to be. Get lots of fiber, and don’t overdo the salt or sat fat."

People often pin America's crap diet on poverty. If people had more money, the theory goes, they'd eat a more nutritious and less obesogenic diet. I've been pushing back against that, because I've seen no evidence for it. Here's a new study! WONKY THREAD WARNING jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...

This is a great example of why the political divide isn't just about politics. It's about a mishmash of values that drive preferences on all kinds of things, including the kind of house and neighborhood you prefer. HT @conradhackett.bsky.social

If you want to show that a diet is effective for something, do a trial with no control group. All kinds of things improve during interventions where people pay attention to you and are trying to help. Today's example: keto and mental illness: www.nytimes.com/2026/03/17/w...

Ah, vertical farms. The sector is collapsing on high energy and infrastructure costs - now, who coulda predicted that? (🙋) www.nytimes.com/2026/03/21/b...

I've been on the nutrition beat for 25 years. Over that time, I have been increasingly persuaded that most nutrition science is junk, and we know almost nothing. Except these 3 things. (gift link, at least I hope so) wapo.st/4bYDRgB

Interesting review of PICKY: How American Children Became the Fussiest Eaters in History. Why did kids stop eating the huge variety of foods they used to eat? Basically, because they could. Take that option away, and everything changes. www.thebulwark.com/p/how-childr...

"Corn export sales drop 18%, soybeans miss all trade estimates" www.farmprogress.com/marketing/ex...

Today in good news ...

One enthusiastic librarian can make up for so many venal narcissists

Freelance journalists and writers: @technologyreview.com has a new call for pitches, for its Kids issue. Pitches due Friday April 3. Please share! More details here: www.linkedin.com/posts/rcourt...

Interesting new study on obesity with and without metabolic abnormalities, and long-term risk of disease (including heart, kidney, liver). Even in the metabolically healthy, obesity is associated w/raised risk of everything. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

"Iran war-induced fertilizer shortage threatens Republicans in farm states ahead of midterms" www.cnbc.com/2026/03/19/i... "Frostic said he purchased nitrogen fertilizer... in January for around $350 per ton. That same product, he said, is now closing in on $600 per ton."

People enrolled in trials for new GLP-1s who don't lose weight know they're in the placebo group - so they're leaving the trial. New trials with placebo controls will be difficult, so we'll probably get more trials that pit different GLP-1s against each other. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

People will die. www.reuters.com/business/hea...

This is wild. Researchers sent stool samples to a bunch of companies that do direct-to-consumer microbiome analysis, and the results were all over the map. Variability among companies was as big as variability among donors. www.nature.com/articles/s42...

You can't see listeria. I ran a farm for 15 years, and no matter how well you know me or how many times you've been to my farm you have NO IDEA about my farm practices. Knowing your farmer does not protect you against food-borne diseases. Don't drink raw milk.

our latest about Peter Attia's rise and fall is about more than just Epstein. it's about someone who researched everything, who calculated every risk, who made his name based on credibility and trust. and now his friendship with Epstein is upending it all. www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...

Y'all know that Celsius and other low-calorie energy drinks are just diet soda with caffeine, right? www.fooddive.com/news/an-ever...

I will continue my one-woman campaign to get athletes and celebrities to stop peddling crap food: Dear athletes and celebs: Please stop peddling crap food! Especially to children. www.wsj.com/cmo-today/co...

Taste test of plant-based dairy finds that, although people prefer actual dairy (with one exception), many ratings for plant-based are pretty good. The lesson here, though, is that plant-based stuff works best as an ingredient (sausage in sauce, milk in coffee) rather than on its own.

We're at war. Democracy is crumbling. People are dying. But we still have to care about why research on ultra-processed foods is complete garbage. So here is a thread about why that is. Start with this WSJ piece. (gift link) 🧵 www.wsj.com/health/welln...

Judge says RFK Jr. likely violated federal procedures when he stocked the advisory committee with anti-vax cronies. Temporarily blocks the new vaccine recommendations. www.medpagetoday.com/pediatrics/v...

Planets and Bright Stars xkcd.com/3219/

Do researchers share their code upon request? Does running their orginal code on the original data produce the original results? We provide evidence in a new Royal Society Open Science publication. Studying more than 1,000 articles which use data from the European Social Survey, we find that... 🧵

It is amazing to watch the public dataset mining (NHANES, UKBB) published in pay-to-play journals cover hot topics (e.g., urinary glyphosate measures) that get shared online and fuel the wellness influencer ecosystem (e.g., glyphosate is killing us, support MAHA and buy my detox). Burn it all down

Some patients find the "food noise" returning after longer-term GLP-1 use. This is kinda similar to bariatric patients - rapid weight loss, then some gradual regain. This is super important to address, for a drug people have to stay on for life. Gift link. www.wsj.com/health/welln...

Since @tomchivers.bsky.social is here but not active, I'm stealing this from his other feed. Because it's exactly right.

This is crazy. @deborahb.bsky.social is reporting that some companies are now declining to recall product when the FDA has asked (often, recalls are voluntary). This is one example.

3 steps to RFK Jr: 1. Journals makes sure any old sciency crap can get published *somewhere* 2. Cranks/grifters cherry-pick the sciency crap that supports their grift 3. Followers believe it because it's "science" and also conforms to their priors www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

WTF, @economist.com? This piece lists some of the great things GLP-1s might do -there's tantalizing but obviously preliminary evidence! But it's dug in on bad things that *might* happen long-term. Never mentions that folks have taken them for 20 years for diabetes, and safety record is excellent.

Maybe we deserve what we’ve got coming to us

If you follow the Epoch Times, it's useful to know that 277K acres of farmland is 1/16 of 1%. (That's if it's all cropland. If it includes pasture, it's half that.)

This is so great. An award for finding and correcting your own mistakes! We need this in journalism, too.

Fascinating Nature study shows how symbiotic bacteria in insects--they provide key amino acids and vitamins--are shedding parts of their genomes, losing their identities and evolving to become part of the host organisms. Paper: www.nature.com/articles/s41... Good writeup: phys.org/news/2026-02...

Seed oils are fine. GMOs are fine. High-fructose corn syrup is bad but no worse than cane sugar. Pasteurizing milk is good. Glyphosate is not causing a disease epidemic. I wrote about RFK’s food and farming insanity. It’s related to his vaccine insanity! www.thebulwark.com/p/robert-ken...