😂

Happy birthday to Charles Darwin, patron saint of tired scientists, grumpy fieldworkers, and hating your own manuscript.

✅ The UK Government has today granted access to half a million UK Biobank participants' coded GP data for health research. This change will dramatically increase the power of UK Biobank's dataset to advance the diagnosis, treatment and management of conditions handled by GPs.

The way UK govt funds science is in the midst of a major transition, with creation of a much more direct link between government priorities & UKRI research funding. My attempt to set in context the biggest upheaval in UK science funding policy since the 1980s: softmachines.org?p=3252

Interesting. Worth a read.

Time for a thread on our Christmas preprint “Origin and evolution of acrocentric chromosomes in human and great apes”. I had so much fun with this project and paper. It will be hard to summarize in a thread, but I’ll try www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... [1/21]

Looks like BBSRC pause will be for a few weeks after which applications will be accepted on a rolling basis. MRC pause apparently till early summer.

😃😃😃😃!!!!

Cool new work from @qmulepigenetics.bsky.social members @pradeepmadapura.bsky.social @manthan5277.bsky.social

Have a look at this fantastic meeting and save the date! The “RNA in Physiology and Disease” conference, hosted by @gensocuk.bsky.social, will take place 7–9 September 2026 in Newcastle, UK. genetics.org.uk/events/rna-i...

What a very cool paper!

At least the physicists are standing up for themselves. Still waiting for the senior leaders of biological sciences to say anything at all about MRC/BBSRC actions.

Woah! 👀👀 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Okaaayy….have just made one small edit to an abstract I am writing….😅

Most definitely took my mind off the grant app I am writing! 😅

Open postdoc position in our lab @icr.ac.uk to develop a cfDNA test for #early detection of colorectal #cancer in inflammatory bowel disease #IBD: jobs.icr.ac.uk/vacancies/14... It's bench-to-bedside research, translating biology of pre-cancer evolution. Funded by @bowelcanceruk.bsky.social

☠️ The world's most dangerous animals by annual deaths.

Keeping generative artificial intelligence reliable in omics biology www.cell.com/patterns/ful... 🧬🖥️🧪

Exciting work!

😅

OMG!!

Need a bit of escapism? Not exactly Lord of the Rings, but in similar vein: doi.org/10.1038/s443...

Couldn’t agree more.

If you’ve heard me talk in the past ~5 years, you will know I have developed an obsession with acrocentric chromosomes. This is all of that, condensed into one paper. I will do a full thread in the new year, but for those that want something to read over the holidays, have at it. Such a cool story!

Human acrocentric chromosome short arm de novo mutation and recombination https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2025.12.16.694519v1

Complete genomes of a multi-generational pedigree to expand studies of genetic and epigenetic inheritance https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2025.12.14.693655v1

Vaults. They are cell biology's greatest puzzle! This preprint from Martin Beck's lab shows them docked on ER membranes with a ribosome inside. What on earth is going on there?? #CellBiology #WTFology www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

ooh good call

These are the types of changes needed at funding agencies.

And of course, if you haven’t already, watch ‘Quest for Fire’. It’s great fun! m.imdb.com/title/tt0082...

Wow!!!!!

This is shocking stuff. John Quackenbush has been brilliant since forever. www.statnews.com/2025/12/05/r...

Proud to announce that four Queen Mary researchers have secured prestigious #ERCCoG Consolidator Grants: Dr Stefaan Verbruggen, Prof Claudia Langenberg, Dr Xuekun Lu and Dr Alexandre De Mendoza Soler. Find out more: www.qmul.ac.uk/media/news/2...

Indeed interesting!

Human gene maps contain major blind spots that leaves out a vast majority of the world's biological diversity, according to a new study led by the CRG's @rodericguigo.bsky.social with @bsc-cns.bsky.social. The researchers uncovered tens of thousands of new transcripts and entirely new genes.

(S)-cargot (R)-cargot

this is mesmerizing

🤯

This looks very interesting!

Happy birthday to the Soviet linguist Yuri Knorozov who casually deciphered the Mayan script in 1952 and got pissed when editors removed his cat as co-author on papers or cropped her out of his author headshot (the only picture of himself he even liked)

Cool stuff!

Please share far & wide. Looking for a #postdoc to get stuck in with a wide range of projects, with freedom to explore and lead the #computational #bioninformatics work 12 months to begin with, but for the right candidate we have funding for a further 19 months www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DPK467/p...

Circadian clock control of ribosome composition promotes rhythmic translation and termination fidelity

AI tells you what you want to hear, statisticians usually tell you what you don't want to hear

Oooh, very interesting!

Beautiful work.

Even chimpanzees think rationally and weigh the evidence when making a choice ;-) @science.org www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

We will soon be looking for a comp biologist or bioinformatician to work on a number of linked projects within the lab - main focus is on molecular control of muscle Before the official advert is published, I’m hoping to spread the news to any talented near-finishing PhDs or keen postdocs!