Tula the cat, who lives in Swindon, Wiltshire, came home with a hilarious note around its neck after the cat used to visit the nearby Toby Carvery to get some delicious meat. www.mirror.co.uk/news/weird-n...

what is human existence? it turns out it’s pretty simple: we are dead stars, looking back up at the sky.” — dr. michelle thaller, nasa astronomer

Let us walk in the woods, says the cat. I’ll teach you to read the tabloid of scents, to fade into shadow, wait like a trap, to hunt. Now I lay this plump warm mouse on your mat. - Marge Piercy #cats #Caturday

Nice work! 👏

Co-convening "The art and science of microbial persuasion" at #ISME20 with Fengping Wang. Cultivation advances: methods, media, uncultured lineages. Coaxing reluctant microbes? Submit your abstract & join us in NZ! isme.live.ws-django.co.uk/public/confe... isme.live.ws-django.co.uk/public/confe...

Excited to see this published! A big part of why SAR11 is so tricky to grow like "normal" microbes.

I spent several weeks this fall visiting elite liberal arts colleges, on the theory that these small, wealthy schools—with a singular focus on undergraduate education and almost no federal research money to threaten—are best poised to weather the crisis in higher education. Here's what I learned:

The prominent scientific journal Nature has corrected a highly cited study about a robot designed to synthesize entirely new materials from scratch, but critics say their concerns haven’t been fully addressed. cen.acs.org/research-int... #chemsky 🧪

Did you know that 2/3 of Americans are at least “somewhat worried” about global warming -- but 85% of Americans either underestimate how many others are worried, or don’t know enough to say? This key misunderstanding tanks our sense of collective efficacy. How do we overcome it? Talk about it!

Archaea, the ultimate survivor www.embl.org/news/science...

A number of our students got the following comment back on a rejection for the NSF GFRP. They are in an eligible STEM field. Is this something people in other places are getting too? Is it a quirk or targeted?

Fuming 😡 Teacher: "you can usually tell the girls that want to do physics, they look a bit tomboy-ish" #WomenInSTEM #ASPIRES3 @iop.org

I wrote this song on Saturday, recorded it yesterday and released it to you today in response to the state terror being visited on the city of Minneapolis. It’s dedicated to the people of Minneapolis, our innocent immigrant neighbors and in memory of Alex Pretti and Renee Good. Stay free

It’s almost like the plan is to bury real research in shite. No more need to ‘trust experts’ 👍🏻 Let the new Dark Ages commence

Genuinely terrifying... Some analysis here if useful by me and @irisvanrooij.bsky.social bsky.app/profile/oliv...

Ugh.. 😒

1. The thing about science that these jokers don't understand is that science cannot be vibe-coded. Whatever its flaws, the point with vibe coding is that you're trying to quickly make something that sorta works, where you can immediately sorta see if it sorta works and then sorta use it.

Ladies and gentlemen, the greatest American songwriter that no one remembers, Blaze Foley. Give him two minutes and he might change your life.

🙄 not surprised

“Tobaliviridae”, a new family of filamentous mycoviruses in the order Martellivirales #virology #virus #viruses #microbiology #MicroSky @springer.springernature.com link.springer.com/article/10.1...

New study suggests that metastatic cancer cells may evade the immune system by stealing mitochondria from immune cells and setting up a ‘shield’ that protects them from being killed by immune cells. Wiley little bastards. #Science 🧪

it's the big day

Cladonia #lichens. #Newfoundland, Canada. #fungi #fungifriends Photo covers about 3cm, left to right.

This is not remotely surprising 😆

It is time to declare the Moon an enemy planet

The Bleeding Tooth Fungus — aka Devil’s Tooth — is straight-up oozing thick, blood-red droplets like it’s alive and bleeding. [📹 fascinatedbyfungi]

I talked to the podcast "Explain It To Me" about why we still struggle with the flu and the common cold. Don't underestimate the power of viruses! Spotify: open.spotify.com/episode/3r0h... Apple: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/w...

Scientists get giddy thinking about what they could do with Perseverance's rocks on Earth. But a new Congressional funding package effectively cancels the missions that would bring them here

BIG FIGHT AT POLAND’S WROCLAW ZOO!!!

Slime molds inside a tree (the Wizard). #slimemold #myxomycetes #fungifriends

Growing up (during my PhD, 25 y ago), I was imprinted with Hurlbert ‘s 1984 paper on « Pseudoreplication and the design of ecological field experiments ». This new paper is essential reading for all students in ecology (and beyond), digging deeper in terminology of design and design flaws 👇

Fossils of a human ancestor from 773,000 years ago may be near the base of the Homo sapiens lineage, representing a common ancestor of modern humans, Neandertals and Denisovans

Cool Paws alert! 👀🆒

New paper alert! tl;dr: the seafloor of Europa is probably tectonically inert, meaning little to no active fracturing that could expose fresh rock to seawater. Without such water–rock reactions the prospect for there being life within Europa just took a big hit. A thread:

Prophet revises time of apocalypse after originally projected date passes uneventfully.

I mean who doesn’t like a chunky perennial target canker on sassafras? #fungi

The more you know. We are all chimeras at a very small level. You likely have cells in your body from your mother and your siblings that were born before you. How this chimerism influences your immune system is beginning to be unraveled. #Science #ScienceSunday

Fog in Tucson is fairly unusual - so we’re all, “Hey look at that!” this morning.

ROV pilots filmed this giant phantom jelly, or Stygiomedusa gigantea, at 253 meters during an ROV descent to explore the Colorado-Rawson submarine canyon wall. #ArgentinianDeepSeeps

Beauty Playing with a Cat — Utagawa Kuniyoshi, ca. 1845

Erbar et al. (2016), “Aristolochia species are generally assumed to be brood-site fraudsters [that] simulate carrion or fungi.” They look & smell like a good place to lay eggs & are pollinated by ovipositing flies. 📷: A. arborea, which mimics fungi. #TropicalBotany #Aristolochiaceae #Botany 🌾🧪🌱

Mycoparasites are both eerie and beautiful. This is Spinellus fusiger, or Bonnet Mold, overtaking a small Mycena mushroom. Its cap transforms into a radiating crown of spores. #MacroMonday #photography #mushroom #fungi #nature #naturephotography #forestfloor #macro #mycology #MushroomMonday

🐧🧊 Incredible underwater footage of penguin life, shot from the first person of one of them. 🇺🇦 This beauty was captured thanks to Ukrainian scientists from the Vernadsky Station in Antarctica, who put a GPS tracker and a tiny camera on the bird.

It’s FunguSunday! Have a gorgeous, green Parrot Waxcap mushroom. I love these, they’re so exotic looking but they’re actually quite common. They love sheep fields particularly 🍄‍🟫💛 #mushroom

Found a giant patch of the bizarre and equally beautiful Collared Calostoma (Calostoma lutescens). I observed this mycorrhizal fungus in this same exact spot 5 years ago but hadn’t been back to check on it until today! #Mushrooms #FungiFriends

Syntrichia ruralis #moss growing on crustose #lichen (Rhizocarpon sp, I think). NWT, Canada. Such a beautiful little moss. #bryophyte #botany #fungifriends

Cladonia verticillata #lichen. Newfoundland, Canada. #fungi #fungifriends