War ravaged Portland yesterday and today

I received this award as a second year student, and it was transformative and a big part of the reason I persisted. They are making things harder just for no reason. I remember the days when we recognized that STEM fields were a worthy national investment 🤦🏾‍♀️

Although highly topical, kleptoparasitism does not get nearly the attention it deserves! Here, a plant exploits the kleptoparasitic behavior of a fly that likes to snatch ants killed by spiders. 🕷️🐜🪰🌿 So the thief itself gets taken advantage of. Nice going, plants! www.cell.com/current-biol...

via Ingrid’s always brilliant buttondown.com/perfectsente...

The "debate me bro" tactic has been the backbone of creationists and anti-climate-change activists for decades. If you want to know why it's stupid to play their game, or want some advice on how to avoid it, talk to any science communicator.

This preprint title for the win! "The First of Us: Ophiocordyceps use a novel scramblase-binding peptide to manipulate zombie ants" doi.org/10.1101/2025... Science is cool too! Authors use #celegans to identify the targets... #cilia and scramblases

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 paper: the genetic program that enables digit formation in limbs is derived from the system that drives cformation of the cloaca. Me, the headline writer:

today’s date is all squares! 9/16/25

🚨 The International Developmental Mechanics Zoom Seminar Series is back on Sept 25! 🎤 We have an exciting line-up of speakers this fall. See the image below for details 🌐 Website: sites.google.com/view/devmech... 📝 Interested in presenting? Sign up here: tinyurl.com/2munv5bv

I just deleted a post that I should have realized immediately is poorly timed and therefore inappropriate. Sorry to @radiofreetom.bsky.social for the mess. Screenshot below for (my) accountability.

Our latest manuscript is out, and this one tackles the problem of cellular aging in the retina, using comparative multiomic analysis of zebrafish, mouse, and humans. What led us to work on aging after studying development and regeneration? Explainer follows./1 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

We preferred Myc but okay

Do you mentor scientific writing, or use written assignments in the science courses you teach? Do you find mentoring/teaching writing hard, or time consuming? (Because it is!) Our new book can help, and it's getting close to being in your hands.

Excited to share our latest work on brain evolution, where we dive into the evolution of Cajal-Retzius cells! If you are interested in cell type evolution and cerebral cortex evo-devo, please read on… www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... 🧵 1/7

In these dark times, it comes as a rare pleasure to highlight @natanaels.bsky.social ‬ & @marcdemanuel.bsky.social's work on germline and somatic mutations in humans. 1/n www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...

The Joshua Tree is the canonical U2 masterpiece but this one (Achtung Baby, 1991) is actually perfect

How did differentiation evolve to allow for complex multicellular systems? In this @cp-trendsecolevo.bsky.social‬ paper, Boolean networks are used to answer long-standing questions in the evolution of cell type diversity. @wcratcliff.bsky.social d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net/115269531/j....

Medieval peasants would not advocate for letting diseases run through entire populations to make a “stronger species,” sorry this one is modernity’s baby.

there is no question in my mind that rfk jr is the most dangerous person in this administration and that his eugenicist ideology threatens the lives of millions of people www.advocate.com/politics/dem...

I wrote about what it was like growing up up Dobson. nymag.com/intelligence...

From the article, "We can value [scientific communication] because it feeds our curiosity, acknowledging that when curiosity is combined with communication, it can lead to other benefits." #SciComm #AcademicSky #learning #ResearchImpact #ScienceFestivals #AcademicResearch #AcademicChatter 👩🏻‍🔬🧪💙📚

And the winner of scientific paper title of the year goes to The evolution of hominin bipedalism in two steps

A am a Bardolator who teaches and trains people in scientific writing. I am professionally, morally, intellectually, and spiritually obligated to quote post this and to beg for permission to reuse with attribution. 🎭👏👏👏👏👏👏👏✍️

How I wish I wrote abstracts vs how I write abstracts…

on the one hand I should absolutely put my phone down but on the other hand what if the forces attacking democracy operate on weeping angels logic

Someone in comments (and now I can't find the actual comment, sorry) said the best Star Wars trilogy is now Andor, Rogue One and Star Wars Ep 4, and you know what, I'm here for that argument, call it the "Death Star Trilogy"

I believe we need to be able to understand what is happening to us. That's the sole reason for my work on knowledge ecosystems over the years, including Covid Tracking Project. A lot of things *can* be known, even in this political blender. We deserve real knowledge, not close-enough flyby guessing.

He’s dead and rotten.

On the left is a rabbit. On the right is an elephant. But guess what: They’re the *same image*, rotated 90°! In @currentbiology.bsky.social, @chazfirestone.bsky.social & I show how these images—known as “visual anagrams”—can help solve a longstanding problem in cognitive science. bit.ly/45BVnCZ

Boston Mayor Michelle Wu: “Silence in the face of oppression is not an option. The U.S. Attorney General asked for a response by today. So here it is…Stop attacking our cities to hide your administration's failures.”

@gauteeinevoll.bsky.social is a theoretical neuroscientist. He was game to make this a convo instead of a Q&A (terrific)! Here, we use my new book as an excuse to discuss: How will we figure out the brain to (eg) treat depression? If you're a fan of the answer "build models", you'll like this one.

Red - the juice of tomatoes! Black - the dark of olives sliced!

unless someone specifically asks for advice it is actually pretty rude to offer it unsolicited, especially when the “advice” is basic “how to live your life as an adult” stuff

it's crazy how we just take for granted now that the president is a deranged racist

Excited to share new #program, STEPS, which can simulate #dynamics of the E. coli Long-Term Evolution Experiment (#LTEE) or other microbes in serial transfer regime. telliamedrevisited.wordpress.com/2025/08/12/s... STEPS developed by @devinmlake.bsky.social, Zachary Matson, Minako Izutsu, and me.

I listened to Bhattacharya on Steve Bannon's "War Room" podcast. If you want to know how it went, see the following email that I just sent. 1/13

see the cities and the towns defac’d By wasting ruin of the cruel foe.

I regularly misspell "competitive" which probably means I'm among the top 10 former journal editors in the "misspells competitive" category

our new paper on pelagic #Asgard archaea that use #rhodopsins with carotenoid antennas to harvest light energy in the oceans. Structural insights into light-harvesting by antenna-containing rhodopsins in marine Asgard archaea www.nature.com/articles/s41... @galitzlil.bsky.social

prescient (from 3 months ago)

Why is no one talking about the fact that two of the greatest pop piano players both have names that both the first name and last name are first names? Makes me think they're both products of some time traveling or alien type phenomenon. Sorry I drank one beer

Happy Friday, Skeethearts! ☕️☀️🩷 It's a nice day to start again. 💜

New lab paper by @merridee.bsky.social identifying a novel role for VTA GABA neurons in behavioral flexibility GABA, but not dopamine, neuron activation correlates with behavior when cues unexpectedly shift from predicting punishment to predicting reward www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

We learned—and keep learning—so much stuff about Medicaid and not all of it fit into the @unbreaking.org Medicaid explainer so here is a blog post I wrote about all those “able-bodied” people the administration and its allies claim are on Medicaid. unbreaking.org/blog/medicai...

#Andor + Dr. Cat Hicks (@grimalkina.bsky.social) one of my favorite voices + psychology of #resistance ✊ + disability justice = MUST READ (and listen)

Some officials and commentators have claimed that millions of “able-bodied” young men in the US are sitting around collecting Medicaid because they don’t want to work. The Medicaid research we’ve compiled says otherwise. unbreaking.org/blog/medicai...

A great skeetorial on a new and much improved method for mapping transcription factor landscapes, with a beautiful image by our own Gloria Fuentes @gloglita.bsky.social from Life Science Editors @lifescienceeditors.bsky.social

🦠🧍‍♀️From bacterial to human immunity. We report in @science.org the discovery of a human homolog of SIR2 antiphage proteins that participates in the TLR pathway of animal innate immunity. Co-led wt @enzopoirier.bsky.social by D. Bonhomme and @hugovaysset.bsky.social www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...