Our puppy turned 1 today. I think I managed to tire her out on a muddy walk!

Sir Ian McKellen performing a monologue from Shakespeare’s Sir Thomas More on the Stephen Colbert show. Never have I heard this monologue performed with such a keen sense of prescience. Nor have I ever been in this exact historical moment.TY Sir Ian, for reaching us once again. #Pinks #ProudBlue

Colleagues of mine @naomilpollock.bsky.social and @alice-rothnie.bsky.social are at a BBSRC event today and have been told that the RM call is paused, until maybe March, to allow them to transition to a open call rather than 3 deadlines a year. Nice that this is widely communicated 😉

I know what they're getting at with the "could put jobs at risk" but can we focus on the immediate impact? Each suspended round at MRC and BBSRC means about 80 fewer postdoc jobs and the retrospective cuts at MRC add another 30 or so

Leaks everywhere and finally we get an official statement, one that somehow manages to say a lot while; No timelines. No clarity. No acknowledgement of impact on ECRs whose careers depend UKRI funding. “Later this year” isn’t a plan. And the sector deserves better than reassurance without detail.

Finally comms from UKRI - on a Sunday evening. No mention of the hundreds of ECRs who will see their careers ended by these decisions and notably no explanation for MRC retrospectively applying cuts and wasting all the work that went into writing, reviewing and scoring applications - £millions

Dynamic DnaA–DnaB interactions at oriC coordinate the loading and coupled translocation of two DnaB helicases for bidirectional replication url: academic.oup.com/nar/article/...

Appalling news for the biosciences in the UK. I have three grants under review at the moment so the last week since I heard these rumours have been a definite career low point. Shifting priorities (read political interference) are bad enough www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-r...

I'm seeing relatively little chatter or outcry about what is happening at the MRC, the UK's biomedical research funder. Before Christmas MRC paused the acceptance of many of its grants, including the standard applicant-led research grant. There has been no public information on what is happening 🧵

Been working flat out since Christmas so decided to take today off. Afternoon plans out the window after a call from Mr4's school. Never work with children or animals 🤣

A quick mental health break before the final grant submission push. Never too cold for a dip if you're a Labrador!

orcas have the chance to do the funniest thing

Some Lego fun with Mr4 on New Year's Eve!

I did some actual science this week - like actual handled some bacteria! Not sure I can make sense of the results or if they will ever see the light of day but I still feel like I did something

Eventful Thursday! Pip cut her paw on something in our house, leading to a quick trip to the vets for some super glue. So she's had to come into the office with me. Apologies to everyone I've talked to today for the barking Labrador in the background!

I had an amazing time at my viva! It was a privilege to work in such an amazing lab and my examiners were so friendly and knowledgeable which led to a great discussion!

Congratulations to the new Dr @bexx-menday.bsky.social! And huge thanks to fantastic examiners Peter Rosenthal and Ellie Harrison

Our paper with @robfagan.bsky.social @jasonwils.bsky.social and Louis-Charles Fortier on #phage has been included in this year's LSA special collection. www.life-science-alliance.org/content/cell...

Kate Willett pass her viva yesterday, congrats Dr Willett! Huge thanks to @robfagan.bsky.social @ @jeremykeown.bsky.social

The deadline for the first of our three fully funded PhD studentships is tomorrow! Determining the role of the dual-function VanT in C. diff vancomycin resistance. Collab with @gavinhthomas.bsky.social and Marjan van der Woude

It's time for our annual lab hike and Christmas dinner - so of course there's torrential rain. I hope the pub has the fires lit!

Inseparable

There's just over 2 weeks left to apply for a fully funded PhD studentship with us working on C. difficile vancomycin resistance. Two more studentships - linked in the thread below - close in early January

Absolutely delighted (and proud) that @freyaallen.bsky.social passed her viva with minor corrections today. Thanks very much @jessicamablair.bsky.social @robfagan.bsky.social for examining!

Thrilled to present the findings from my 2025 #SUREscheme project - 'Investigating the influence of latent bacteriophages on healthcare-associated C. difficile lysogens' - at the showcase yesterday evening. Huge thanks to @funnirudh.bsky.social and @robfagan.bsky.social for making this possible!

🚨 Fully funded PhD studentships 🚨 We have three fully funded PhD studentships available for Oct 26 start. Funded by the MRC DiMeN programme & the BBSRC Yorkshire Biosciences DTP. Details below as they are advertised. Contact me here or via email for more details or to discuss an application

🚨 Fully funded PhD studentships 🚨 We have three fully funded PhD studentships available for Oct 26 start. Funded by the MRC DiMeN programme & the BBSRC Yorkshire Biosciences DTP. Details below as they are advertised. Contact me here or via email for more details or to discuss an application

And just like that PhD student number 9 has finished! Congratulations Dr @anneswilliams.bsky.social and huge thanks to @claireyt.bsky.social and Laurence Wilson for acting as examiners. In the chaos yesterday I didn't get a photo so instead here's a drawing of our puppy by multi-talented Dr Williams

The UK needs to be "culturally coherent" apparently - it's incredibly concerning when these disgusting racists feel comfortable enough to say this kind of garbage in public

Nesting habits of a 60lb Labrador puppy. So well camouflaged I almost didn't see her....

Who says TV isn't educational? I just had our 4 year old explain coastal erosion to me - courtesy of the Octonauts apparently

Beautiful CryoEM work by our University of Sheffield colleagues @molmicrosheffield.bsky.social Structural basis of multitasking by the apicoplast DNA polymerase from Plasmodium falciparum url: academic.oup.com/nar/article/...

Starting the day with news of a fire in our office early this morning. Thankfully no one hurt and no lasting damage but an unpleasant start to the day!

LMB PhD studentship available in the Baum lab to use informatics to infer cell structure from genomic data in collaboration with the brilliant Tom Williams. If you write to me and I don’t reply - try again - the spam filter is hungry…

Making the most of a few days off before I have to get back to the day job! I think I've finally found the puppy's limit

There are definite benefits to living on the edge of the Peak District. 5 min walk from our front door we reach the edge of the woods and after that the only limit is my legs. Today's mission was to clear my head and tire out the puppy

Having a few days off to recover from a really full on summer & to get some DIY jobs done so we can sell our house. Was all going well until I got the carpet cleaner out. Managed to do half of one room before the magic white smoke escaped. Now two upset dogs and all the windows open. House stinks 😩

Sigh...

Willing to join us @pasteur.fr for a PhD for a project on how interactions between mobile genetic elements shape bacterial adaptation? Subject to be tailored to candidates with keen interest in evolution, genomics, computational biology, microbiology. Check www.pasteur.fr/en/education...

👏👏👏 👏👏

Saturday morning Lego fun with Mr4!

Our French hosts really outdid themselves with the venue for last night's #ClostPath2025 congress dinner. A fantastic night, a fantastic week of science and now just two years to wait to do it all again in Rio

Looking back at a great #clostpath2025, and ahead to #icds2026 (Bled) and #clostpath2027 (Rio de Janeiro).

Delighted to see some excellent work on C. diff vancomycin resistance at ClostPath. The evidence for emerging resistance is mounting and it's becoming clear that even fairly low level resistance causes treatment failure

Lab on tour - the wonderful #ClostPath2025 organisers have arranged great walking tours. Guess where we are?

Our RW media are sharks. Labour spent the summer feeding them buckets of raw chum. 76 anti-immigration tweets in August 2025 from Starmer's Twitter account, the Home Office, and the official Number 10 account. I compiled them all into a 10-minute Youtube video. www.youtube.com/watch?v=naaj...

net immigration fell by more than half last year and the politics has gone in the complete opposite direction. It's not really about the numbers

I'm tempting fate here but the transpennine express hasn't let me down yet - first stage of journey to #ClostPath2025 underway

The posters are done so we're officially ready for #ClostPath2025 @pasteur.fr next week. Now all I have to do is submit a programme grant and 3 PhD studentship applications and I'll be good to go too!