Please join me in congratulating Woman on her appointment

NEW: ProPublica obtained records from the Department of Agriculture that detail the millions of pounds of food, down to the number of eggs, that never reached food banks because of the Trump administration’s cuts to an aid program.

Newsom: "If any California university signs this radical agreement, they’ll lose billions in state funding – including Cal Grants – instantly. California will not bankroll schools that sell out their students, professors, researchers, and surrender academic freedom"

My fellow academics: the @aaup.org is doing amazing work, successfully! defending faculty and universities against attacks from Vought/the Trump administration. Proud to be a member. It takes only 3 minutes to join, to support them fighting the good fight for all Americans ✊ www.aaup.org

BREAKING: Our client Mario Guevara, an Emmy-winning journalist detained by ICE in retaliation for livestreaming law enforcement activity, will be deported tomorrow to El Salvador. Mario and his family are being punished for his reporting. This cruelty is meant to stifle our free press.

"This is extortion, plain and simple.... The only solution is solidarity and collective action against this effort at federal control over higher education." A sobering analysis of the illegality of the administration's "compact" and its stakes for higher ed. 🎁🔗 www.nytimes.com/2025/10/02/o...

The US Administration is now illegally impounding federal funding for our universities unless they turn away international students *regardless of their talent and qualifications*. Arbitrary 15% quota on int'l students, with no more than 5% from a single country (anti-China, anti-India).

A literal mob-style protection racket

Loyalty oaths for universities. The thing of the Third Reich. www.nytimes.com/2025/10/02/u...

Everyone should speak up now

Obviously there are institutions—eg Liberty University—that will find these demands relatively easy to absorb and consistent with their mission. Everyone else's job right now is to convince the UVAs and Dartmouths of the world that if they go along, they are Liberty University.

Despite These Times...my department is hiring! I really like my department, we have a good mix of disciplines and organisms and we're really low-drama. We also get pizza at faculty meeting. So if you're a computational and structural biologist, join us! 🧪 jobs.rutgers.edu/postings/260...

And here I thought the republicans control all three branches of government

SCOOP: At 9:35am on Wednesday, the first morning of the US government shutdown, employees at the Small Business Administration (SBA) received a template from human resources for their suggested “out of office” email. They were advised to blame the Democrats.

Repost on behalf of NPR: "Today marks the first day in public media’s history without federal funding. It’s the beginning of a new chapter – (...) Your donation today will help keep us strong on the road ahead – click the link below to join us. n.pr/4gTpzPo?utm_...

Job Opp: Do you want to be the driver of those next steps as a PhD student? If you have a strong background in synthetic chemistry & chemical biology, we want to hear from you - hiring for 2026! tu-dresden.de/mn/chemie/oc...

Stress-Free Eric Adams Spends Day Bribing Pigeons In Central Park

So overwhelmed by (re(re))-review requests that I just lost track of what needs to be done #PeerReviewIsBroken #chemsky ⚗️🧪

A lot of people think that every international student admitted means one fewer spot for domestic students, when the opposite is more likely true - the tuition revenue international students bring allows public universities to provide substantial discounts to domestic students, improving access.

Not a single one of our institutions has any intention of protecting its faculty or defending the integrity of intellectual inquiry at this moment. This is of the most disturbing versions of that story I’ve read: it keeps getting worse and worse as you go

Targeted attack on a dockside restaurant in North Carolina. Three dead. Suspect a former Marine sniper in Iraq and Haiti who tried to sue the US govt for “genocide against straight men by the LGBQT community.” Flags at half mast? Endless op-eds? Victims’ faces on coins? www.cnn.com/2025/09/28/u...

The President of the United States has posted a fake AI video of himself announcing a non-existent policy to give people access to a fake miracle cure that also doesn't exist truthsocial.com/@realDonaldT... We are fully through the looking glass, folks.

Wild stuff. Wild

Listen to someone who has been through it under Putin.

'“Citizens will be on their best behavior, because we’re constantly recording and reporting everything that is going on,” Ellison said in an hour-long Q&A during Oracle’s Financial Analyst Meeting last week.'

So top Portland cops wrote & *testified* that fed agents have been "instigating and causing" conflict. They said agents were firing pepper balls unprovoked and "without any apparent warning" When a Portland chief called a federal agent w/ Qs, the agent hung up. www.oregonlive.com/crime/2025/0...

This is literally what the actual "siege" of the auxiliary ICE building looks like

The South Korean Ministry of Defense has awarded medals of merit to 11 officers for disobeying direct orders of superiors during the martial law fiasco, orders that they deemed to be contrary to the constitution and endangerment to democracy. www.chosun.com/english/nati...

Comment period ends on Monday for a proposed rule change that would terminate student visas after 4 years. It also puts limits on exchange visitors and reps of foreign media, and shortens the length of time at the end of the visa from 60 days to 30 days. www.federalregister.gov/documents/20...

Breaking: Oklahoma State Superintendent Ryan Walters has resigned after porn allegations. Walters is the guy who directed public schools to incorporate the Christian Bible and Ten Commandments into instruction, which triggered lawsuits over church–state separation.

Come be my newest colleague! jobs.wisc.edu/jobs/assista...

Just a reminder before the “big announcement” today. Autism was discovered in 1911 and the modern definition of Autism came in 1943. Tylenol wasn’t widely used until the 1950s. Anyone trying to tell you that Tylenol causes Autism isn’t someone that should be taken seriously.

To err is Homan?

At the risk of staying the obvious ... If you sign this, you are in no way a journalist.

Asking BlueSky for help: For a review, I am trying to accurately credit the first paper that measured pairwise 3D distances between 2 pieces of DNA on the same chromosome (or cosmid). Is Trask 1989 the first? I know of earlier single-locus papers (1982). www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

This is the playbook, folks. If you're not paying attention now and doing something about it, then you're going to have to sit down the rest of your life because democracy is being taken away. Do not be quiet in this moment.

The University Democrats at UT-Austin, a longstanding student group, has been told that no guests, candidates, or speakers can speak at their meetings unless the administration approves them. Submitted speakers' lists have been ignored or summarily denied. Please HMU if you know a good 1A attorney

Not going away, Donald.

So, what is your strategy to reviewing such a paper for a leading journal in your field?

Cambodia and Armenia woke up not knowing they’ve been fighting each other According to the president, Armenia has also been fighting Albania and Aberbaijan - not to confuse with Azerbaijan

After a great photoswitching/catalysis conference in Vienna (photoexcite.ist.ac.at) now in Yerevan for another meeting with a great lineup of speakers (newtrendschem.org ) 🧪⚗️ #chemsky

Donald Trump is way less popular than he wants you to believe. And you are significantly more powerful than he wants you to think.

The free speech activist who built a list of professors he worked to get fired for their speech must be celebrated for his support of free speech, and anyone who quotes his speech accurately in context will be fired and/or face state punishment by the champions of free speech, do I have that right?

📣 PhD position now open for Oct 2026 start based at @imperialchemistry.bsky.social: tinyurl.com/PhDFDF. An interdisciplinary project combining experimental & computational materials discovery in a collaborative Royal Society-funded team. Co-supervised by @beckylgreenaway.bsky.social.

Congrats to Daniil & collabs from the Liu group at NTU on the #HOTpaper in @angewandtechemie.bsky.social bit.ly/4ncBOJm where we show how heterocycle basicity and H-bonding ability affect the photoswitching and thermal isomerization mechanism of hydrazone switches 🧪⚗️#chemsky #NSFfunded #molswitch

That's about 10% of the population. Quite literally, "decimated."

UC Berkeley gives the Trump admin the names of 160 faculty + students for a federal investigation into “alleged antisemitic incidents.” Judith Butler, one of the targeted scholars, tells me: "It is an enormous breach of trust... It's shocking. Did you consider not complying with this request?”

Finally! 🤩 Our position piece: Against the Uncritical Adoption of 'AI' Technologies in Academia: doi.org/10.5281/zeno... We unpick the tech industry’s marketing, hype, & harm; and we argue for safeguarding higher education, critical thinking, expertise, academic freedom, & scientific integrity. 1/n

Northern Ireland man from Lisburn kidnapped by Trump’s Ice raids because he “looked like a Mexican”. He had the correct visa, all his documents. He’s never been in trouble with police. Held in terrible conditions. A fellow captive couldn’t get his medication and dropped dead of a heart attack